I'm as liberal as they come but I will be voting for Rand Paul if he ends up with the Republican nomination. This is one issue where I will be a one issue voter.
Bernie Sanders seems like a great candidate, but I fear he is too reasonable and conciliatory to do what is necessary to properly reign in the entrenched interests of the military/intelligence industrial complex. At this point it seems like nothing short of a campaign of slash-and-burn against these agencies will get the job done, and it's going to take someone as "nutty" as a Paul to do it.
As far as I know he is pro-states rights when it comes to abortion and gay marriage. That is, he supports a weak federal government and the right of states to make these decisions.
But either way, the issue of unconstitutional surveillance, and the entrenched interests in favor of it, is by far the single most important issue facing this country. I will be casting my vote with this fact in mind.
It is absurd to judge someone's commitment to liberal ideals by how they weigh the relative importance of issues.
> he is pro-states rights when it comes to abortion and gay marriage
I don't know about Rand Paul, and certainly many state's rights supporters are sincere, but be aware that state's rights has long been adopted by those who simply didn't like national law on a particular issue, for example on racial segregation. I'm always suspicious when I hear the term used like a philosphical principle.
> As far as I know he is pro-states rights when it comes to abortion and gay marriage.
Presumably, this refers to a different Senator Rand Paul than the one that sponsored the Life at Conception Act with the explicitly stated motivation to ban abortion federally. [0]
That is unfortunate. But that is a bitter pill I'm willing to swallow for someone I believe will actually reign in surveillance. Backsliding on social issues can be corrected in the future. But there comes a point where the surveillance state is so ubiquitous and their grip on the country so strong, that there's no dialing it back. The direction we're headed with surveillance presents a clear and present danger to America as we know it.
Personally if I had to choose between banning abortions or a government that completely ignores the 4th amendment I'd have to choose to ban abortions.
Luckily this is just a distraction issue and even if Paul did manage to get his legislation passed it would never stick. I know the leftists would really like everyone to think that he'll appoint supreme court justices that are literally immortal, but those guys die all the time.
Libertarians are the original Gay Rights and Abortion Rights supporters, going back to the 1970s. When Obama and Hillary were still anti gay-marriage (in 2013, before it became something they couldn't ignore) and when Bill Clinton was signing the "Defense of Marriage Act" along with 3/4 of Congressional Democrats approval... and for two decades even prior to that, Libertarians were in favor of getting the government out of marriage.
Notice the Libertarian position is not the same as the mainstream "Gay Marriage" position. Libertarians would legalize Poly marriage as well, while I've had Gay Marriage Advocates give me a list of reasons why that shouldn't be legal.
While some Libertarian candidates are personally against abortion, they would be laughed out of the movement if they advocated actually passing laws at the federal level to restrict it. Hey, I'm even personally not a fan of it (though I paid for one once) but that is completely different from being willing to support their bans, and I wouldn't support someone who wanted to ban them. (And yet I work for the Michael Badnarik campaign for a little while and he was "anti-abortion")
Rand is going to have a tough time getting the republican nomination because that party hasn't quite realized that it's being to conservative and not responsible enough.
So I don't mind that he's not taking a stand on these things.
In fact, if we were in a climate where gay rights were being restricted (increased restrictions) or abortion were being fought (at the federal level) then I might be more worried about it. But we are not. W ran on a strong anti-abortion platform and nothing really happened during his term. He didn't even try. He knew it was a wedge issue, more than anything. Only at the state level are Abortions at risk.
The real crime of our time is the out of control federal spying, adventurism and rights violations.
(this is not a rebuttal to hackinthebochs who said nothing I disagree with.)
EDIT: My statements are historical fact and consistent with what's known about libertarians: They want the state out of these kinds of decisions. Yet I'm downvoted. Is it because I'm pointing out that the Democrats don't really support gay rights? Sorry, but it's true. When clinton signed DoMA with broad democrat support, I was out. Sure the republicans were worse at that time, but I'm not going to compromise the idea that I don't have a right to get married!
Even in the 1990s the Libertarians were the only party that was clearly pro gay rights and so I joined them. The past 20 years have proven me right. I take down votes (without comments or rebuttals) as merely an admission of the frustration at this truth.
Gay Marriage Advocates tend to be skittish of embracing poly marriage because that would make them look more extreme. If they can show that their position is not the most extreme one out there, then they have a better chance of seeing their agenda actually become reality. The funny thing is that while poly marriage advocates might not like that right now, in the long run it might actually help them because it will probably speed up the necessary changes.
The broadest possible reading of the essence of marriage is a single relationship entered into exclusively, voluntarily and with full awareness.
An arranged marriage fails the voluntary test.
A union involving a young child fails the awareness test.
A unions that includes a non-human entity fails the voluntary and awareness tests.
A union of three or more entities fails the exclusivity test. (Between two people there is just one relationship. Between three people there are three relationships.) I have no problem with the idea in theory, but it will require a lot of structural change of law to implement and is therefore sufficiently different to warrant a different technical term in law.
> Between two people there is just one relationship.
no there isn't.
my wife talks to my dad in a way i never have. they get each other. they understand one another, and she respects aspects of him that i didn't know existed until i saw that a lot of what i love about my wife is true of my dad.
my wife talks to my mom in a way i haven't understood until recently. my mom is very loving; i never knew how much more loving she was until recently, when my wife explained just how intense that is.
i have a relationship with mama, my catonese mother-in-law, who understood the importance of computers even when it was the early 90's and she'd never seen one, who grew up during the cultural revolution, who doesn't trust authority figures for the same reason i don't.
my wife is good friends with many of my siblings - that's 8 more relationships there; 13 when you include the in-laws. my brother matt is married to michelle, who's talked to my wife, christine, about a lot of topics, and the two of them have a relationship far more intense than many biological siblings.
no man is an island.
no man is an island.
no man is an island.
no man is an island.
please for the love of all that is good in the world, can we stop pretending otherwise?
How is exclusivity crucial to marriage in the maximal broadness sense? It might be crucial in the current legal landscape, but that's not what we're talking about here. I tend to think that in the broadest possible sense marriage is just a contract and there's nothing preventing it from including more than two parties. Or, even if you do create a compelling argument for it being a contract between only two people, why should that preclude me from making another similar contract with a different party?
We are absolutely talking about the current legal landscape. If you want to discuss polygamy in a spherical cow universe, that's fine, and I've already said I have no in-principle objection to formalizing polygamy.
However, a union between three or more people (or multiple concurrent marriages) is in an engineering sense a very different mechanism. It has more moving parts and more complicated parts. Most critically, its interfaces to the outside world are different.
It would require substantial root-and-branch changes to a massive amount of existing legislation in every country and state. Using a different word in law (while accepting colloquial use of the word marriage in everyday parlance) is a practical necessity.
> However, a union between three or more people (or multiple concurrent marriages) is in an engineering sense a very different mechanism.
Forming, adding to, withdrawing from, dissolving, and otherwise handling unions of three or more people, including in dealing with how the members of the union deal with their rights and powers vis-a-vis the property and prerogatives of the union as such between each other and in interfacing with outside entities has been dealt with fairly extensively over the past several centuries in the evolution of partnership law. And most of it can be viewed as a fairly direct multiparty generalization of the two party way similar things are dealt with in existing marriage.
There's no real reason that a generalization of marriage law to handle multiparty relationships that reduced naturally to the same handling for two-party cases as status quo rules would deserve any different name.
Sorry, but polygamy doesn't get to ride the coattails of gay marriage for free. Despite the howls from conservatives, this slope isn't inherently slippery. You have to change minds before you can discuss changing laws. (And besides, I thought we all agreed the anthrozoologists were next in line? Then NAMBLA. Wait your turn.)
I have always wondered why the government is involved with marriage at all. Seems like it would be simpler if we set it up like this:
Everyone pays the same taxes no matter what, and you better write an explicit will and testament to control who gets your stuff when you die/can pull the plug on your vegetative state. Ie. no special benefits/drawbacks for married people.
If you want to get married, great---go find a church or a mosque or a ship's captain; it's none of the state's business. The government doesn't recognize the institution of marriage as anything special. Marriage would be an entirely private association, like joining the Elks lodge or something.
That's "simpler" in the "fewest number of base rules" sense, and more complex in the UX sense.
Given the frequency of the desire to enter into a partnership with something like the kind of mutual exchange of commitments and agency relationships packaged in civil marriage, it makes sense as a UX optimization for government in terms of providing sensible defaults for common needs (with the ability for users interested in different configurations to reconfigure the defaults to a certain degree.)
Funnily enough, I too have often wondered about that.
I've also often wondered why your gender is the state's business at all. One way to make the whole gay marriage thing a non-issue would be to say it's nobody's business what you have between your legs, except your doctor and your partner.
There are a couple of scenarios where it would be an issue, like if you go to jail and there are no mixed gender jails, but it's likely that a little bit of imagination would fix that.
Just because people downvote you doesn't mean they disagree with you, or what you said is not factual. Hyper-political comments tend to get downvoted on HN in general because of the type of toxic comment threads they breed. Having libertarianism vs democrats categorization, gay rights, and abortion in one thread fits that category quite well.
> This is one issue where I will be a one issue voter.
Consider all the other issues. For example, with Rand Paul as President, the GOP would certainly control the White House, and House of Representatives, very likely have a 6-3 majority on the Supreme Court within a few years (depending on Justice Ginsberg) ... they'd need only the Senate for one-party rule.
Many, many other things would happen that you probably would not like.
When you become an utterly dependable one-party voter you really diminish your say in what your party stands for.
More than that, though, if Rand Paul actually got the nomination -- which he almost certainly won't -- and went on to win the general election, that would potentially be a lot bigger than one minor victory in the constant right-vs-left tug-of-war over American government. It would be a political realignment, because the coalition Rand Paul would build and the platform he would run on are not the traditional Republican coalition and platform.
It could be the start of America actually having a pro-liberty party. That tradeoff might be worth it even for folks on the left who lean libertarian.
The only other option is Sanders and he seems to just want to concentrate all power at a federal level, like the USSR did. The left claims to want a more European style governance model but fail to accept that the EU does not have one healthcare system, does not have one schooling system, and does not have one college system.
When you concentrate all power into a small point it makes manipulating that power much easier for the elites. No longer do they have to bribe politicians in each state, just the ones in Washington DC. The founding fathers knew this (they experienced this with the British Monarchy) and that's why they intended on having a very limited federal government that had little control over social programs and whose main purpose was to see that states take it upon themselves to enforce rights provided by the constitution.
Remember when we integrated schools? The left would like you to believe the DOE is some kind of federal schooling system when in fact all it really does is issue pell grants. The federal government did not take over the schooling sector. The only thing the federal government did was step in when a state refused to integrate.
I urge leftists to reconsider their position. I'm in favor of social programs like single payer healthcare, but having the federal government do it is just asinine. The federal government needs to pass a bill that makes healthcare a right, then leave it up to the states to implement free healthcare. Those that don't will be forced to, just like we did when some schools refused to integrate.
If you hate too big to fail companies, then why allow one entity to monopolize a whole sector of the economy? As soon as one of these huge social programs fails, down goes the whole economy. It happened in the USSR and it could happen here. Just let the states handle it like they do in the EU. That way, when one states social programs fail it doesn't bring down the whole economy. Notice that this is a compromise. The left still gets it's healthcare while the right still gets a small federal government. It's a win-win. Unfortunately both the left and right would like you to believe that any compromise is giving into the other side, they must perpetuate the idea that you only have one right choice and that if you're not with them you're completely against them.
I've read your comment. I might have responded if it weren't for the stuff such as "like the USSR did". Sentences like that make it obvious that any discourse would be futile.
It wouldn't be fair to compare the US to socialized countries like individual European nations because most European nations aren't world powers policing the globe and have much more economic and political stability. Most socialized European nations aren't experiencing social unrest or widespread disagreement about social policies.
The US on the other hand has much more disagreement. The USSR consisted of many countries dominated by the Soviets who didn't agree with many policies of the government. While the US isn't taking over other countries and making more US states, the states are already similar to small countries.
As we concentrate power more and more at a federal level we take away sovereignty from the individual states. This, in my opinion is very similar to what lead to the collapse of the Soviet Union. They spread themselves thin and forced everyone to assimilate under one political ideology. This only works when a large portion of the country agrees with said policies.
While the US will probably never suffer the same fate as the USSR, I could easily see us spreading our selves to thin across the globe, mismanaging money, and pissing everyone off, thus leading to economic decline and loss of faith in the political system as a whole (this is already happening).
America won't be able to handle socialism. We want too many things.
Yeah I've seen that before, and it's obviously false and slightly nutty (as long as there are people voluntarily willing to provide care--and there will be--there is no force involved). But going up against the entrenched interests to reign in defense and spying is going to take someone slightly nutty. So at least on this particular issue its a virtue.
I'm aware that his politics comes with some, possibly many unsavory views, but I fully believe unchecked surveillance presents an existential crisis to America as we know it. Backsliding on marriage or abortion can be corrected in the future. There comes a point where there's no turning back the clock on ubiquitous surveillance.
If it came down to Sanders and Paul, it would be a tough decision to make and I'd probably lean Sanders out of concern for all the other issues. But at this point Paul is more likely to get the nomination for his party than Sanders so it seems like a moot discussion.
But the fact that I haven't heard Sanders make surveillance the forefront of his campaign is a bit concerning. Also the fact that he didn't make an appearance at Paul's "filibuster" says quite a bit. Say what you want about how useless the filibuster was, lack of awareness of the facts around the surveillance issue is the biggest factor in the government's favor. Making a very loud and public stand against surveillance has tangible benefits. I was disappointed that he didn't take advantage of that opportunity.
> If it came down to Sanders and Paul, it would be a tough decision to make and I'd probably lean Sanders out of concern for all the other issues. But at this point Paul is more likely to get the nomination for his party than Sanders so it seems like a moot discussion.
Not that you can tell much about who is likely to win the nomination this far out from the first primary (basically, what you can tell now is name recognition prior to significant campaigning, which would mislead as to the winner of the nomination in most elections where there isn't an incumbent President or Vice President in the primary.)
Bernie Sanders does appear much more consistent than Hillary; and he unlike Hillary has talked of dismantling the NSA. I'm afraid he won't make the Democratic nomination.
The other republicans seem like a bunch of idiots. It's likely that Hillary will come to power. She does seem to have the money for it.
Good for him. This "freedom act" bait and switch is nonsense IMOP. I don't care much about politics, nor about Paul, but on this issue I agree. They need to sit down and develop a comprehensive plan without the secrecy (except at operational levels), without the sensationalism and fear mongering and without the blatant and quickly revealed lies that have come out of NSA personal and Obama's mouths.
Most importantly, we need to be clear on the objectives. As it is there is a pervasive dirty feeling that the the ulterior motive is surveillance and control of US citizenry for purposes of retaining power. This might not be the case but with the amount of deceit that has recently occurred many people feel this way. So they need to start over in a transparent and trustworthy way.
He represents a certain ideological constituency which will sustain his campaign as a means of getting their ideas heard. If the US were a parliamentary system, then he and his ideological fellows could form a party that would have a decent shot at getting enough votes to form a coalition-of-legislators with another larger party.
The US is however not a parliamentary system so coalition-building happens at the voter level rather than the legislator level. Many libertarians are forming a coalition-of-voters with the Republican party and by supporting Rand Paul are hoping to shift the Republican party libertarian-ward. He does not however currently represent a large enough ideological constituency that he would be able to form a coalition-of-voters large enough to actually be elected president.
> I've been waiting for years...
I'm curious what you thought of Ron Paul's candidacy.
afarrell-- in the early days of the 1992 campaign I felt exactly the way you do, about Bill Clinton. I was a Paul Tsongas supporter then. We all know how that turned out.
After losing twice in a row, the Republicans know they have to change.
It's still early and the old style christian-conservative out-dated positions on foreign policy, "law and order" etc people are still around, but it's clear they are on the out.
The question is, how fast will the republican party change?
And a lot of that kind of change happens during these big elections.
So, early broad support for Rand Paul is exactly what could prompt the shift.
After all, when a party can count on a constituency (And at this point where are christian conservatives going to go?) they can take them for granted and seek out the constituency that is at risk.
That should be the Gay constituency for democrats who have taken them for granted and abused them for decades. (I'm not heterosexual, so that includes me, and that's why I haven't voted for a democrat for 20+ years.)
> After losing twice in a row, the Republicans know they have to change.
Are you sure? Incumbents rarely lose, and it was a very close election. Couple that with the wave the Republicans had in the midterm elections (especially in a few states that typically go blue), I could see the Republican party just thinking it's their turn now. If anything the Republicans would want to avoid a split caused by alienating their base.
I should note that I am not a Christian conservative, just doing some backseat political analysis.
> Incumbents rarely lose, and it was a very close election.
But Romney wasn't a hardcore Christian Conservative either.
> If anything the Republicans would want to avoid a split caused by alienating their base.
The religious right may not love Rand Paul but they hate Hillary Clinton. Most of them would show up to vote against her regardless of who the Republican candidate was. Meanwhile Rand Paul has more appeal with swing voters and libertarian-leaning Democrats than any of the other Republican candidates. If he won the nomination he would have a solid position in the general election.
>The religious right may not love Rand Paul but they hate Hillary Clinton.
In light of the recent revelations regarding CGI I don't see how anyone, Republican or Democrat, could vote for Hillary Clinton. It'll be disastrous for the party to nominate her, and even worse for the republic if she wins.
He doesn't have a shot. But he deserves a tremendous amount of praise for making it one of his hallmark issues. He'll raise the visibility of it and force his competitors to comment.
Maybe, just maybe, one of his competitors will listen and be forced to adjust.
People don't always seek their party's nomination because they think they can win. Paul, I think, is too far away from mainstream thought and run of the mill corruption to be able to raise the money to win his party's nomination.
Think of all the people running for the Republican slot, this time and last time. Most of them know they have no chance.
They might just want to influence the debate, and move whoever wins closer to a position that they want.
Or they may be looking for book deals and talk show employment.
Or it might just be a way to enjoy good food for 18 months.
Or maybe they just have a huge ego and like to stand in front of cheering people.
Here's something you didn't mention in your excellent list of motivations: Money
When you're a politician you raise campaign chests, and when you retire, you get to keep those contributions.
So, running for president puts you on the national stage, allows you to raise a lot more money.
For someone like Ron Paul this was a win-win. He secured a nice retirement while getting out there and invigorating a grassroots Libertarian movement and also getting his message-- which I think nobody can dispute he's genuinely passionate about-- out there.
For someone like Rick Santorum, though, it's either to help secure his seat against his next challenger, or just greed...
His biggest challenge is the primaries, where turnout is low and dominated by ideologically extreme party members (in theory, the more ideological you are, the more motivated you are to vote). For example, I read several years ago that the Tea Partiers accounted for half of GOP primary votes, even though they are a small portion of the electorate. His competitors are towing the extremist line, for example competing with each other over who can be most hawkish; he's not and it may cost him. Also, Fox News (and the Wall St Journal) have enormous influence among those voters and the desire and track record of nakely using it to promote their favorites; it's difficult to win without being on their good side. I'm not sure of Paul's status with Fox, but his positions don't seem like a good match.
Opposing or equivocating on gay marriage, no matter what the rationale, and some of his other more conservative ideas, will be a tough sell in the general election.
He's got a shot in the way anyone who declares a candidacy and meets the legal requirements has a shot. If you're talking about odds of getting the nomination (let alone winning the general), then he's got basicly zero chance.
It doesn't matter how he polls against Clinton, if he has no chance of winning the Republican nomination. Gingrich, Santorum, and RuPaul were similarly "a few points" behind Obama in 2012, and they had just as little chance of ever becoming president.
I changed the original headline to be more accurate. Paul's saying he'll block votes on USA Freedom or any extension to the current laws, which means that several clauses in the Patriot Act will sunset (section 215 including the phone dragnet and business records, roving wiretap, and lone wolf).
Some parts of the original Patriot Act were written to expire. It's easier to get rid of those parts than it is to get rid of the rest because it's easier to prevent something from happening in congress than to cause something to happen.
Anyone remember a certain president who was supposed to shut down guatanamo within a few months within being in office? This has the same 'smell' to it ...
He is stating intent to do a specific thing on a specific day in the very near future (tomorrow) without precondition or contingency on outcome of any other events. This is not even remotely the same thing as "if I am elected I will..."
Anyone remember the big ol' freak out in congress in response to closing Gitmo and moving detainees to the U.S. proper? In 2009, the Senate approved an amendment to the Supplemental Appropriations act for that year that blocked funds to move or release Gitmo detainees, by a vote of 90-6.
That shit wasn't gonna happen. And maybe Obama ought to have known better, but he sure isn't exclusively at fault there.
Well, I can't source it via a link at the moment (I'm looking) but I have had multiple face-to-face conversations with people who have told me that Rand Paul has been invited to NSA 5-6 times, and refuses to visit.
Because visiting the NSA would enlighten him in any way?
Critics of the organization would likely be granted zero visibility into their decision making process. Just look how they have treated their own high level employees who voiced concern (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake).
It would be a waste of a day. Maybe he could have met with Clapper - the man that perjured himself before Congress. Or Keith Alexander - the profiteer who is making millions off surveillance tech he was developing while head of the NSA. ( <-- That's the guy that made policy decisions on how invasive surveillance should be. FML) If the cronies want his ear: they should come to his office.
If anything, a visit to the NSA would bring negative connotations in the public's eye.
If politicians don't care about their brand, they've pursued the wrong career.
The visible nature of a visit would be exploited. He'd be painted as guilty by association. Politics is petty... so much so that, in this case, a superPAC-funded negative campaign ad (running 24-7 in battleground states) would say: "Rand Paul visited the NSA 6 times since he's been a Senator, yet he preaches reform. So let's ask you Senator: 'why are you in bed with the NSA?'"
Let's keep in mind: there's no way if OP's story or sources are true --- maybe he has met with NSA -- and if he has, I'd hope he wouldn't go around blabbing about it, for the above reason ^^
"Senator Rand Paul was invited 6 times to talk to the NSA about its anti-terror data collection programs. 6 times Senator Rand Paul refused to even listen to the patriots working to keep our country safe, yet he claims to know what's best for our national security. Is this someone we can really trust as president?"
The bullshit can be written however. If you're taking the subject seriously (and it's a subject that ought to be taken quite seriously), it's your job to hear what the various parties have to say, even if you're sure you won't agree. It's his job as senator.
>So let's ask you Senator: 'why are you in bed with the NSA?
Despite what HN believes, the NSA isn't a criminal enterprise, and being associated with it isn't a scandal which would tarnish a presidential candidate to any degree worth being concerned about - associating with the NSA is part of a senator's job. It would definitely be a president's job.
What he should be concerned about is giving the appearance of making principled stands based on willful ignorance. If he intends to run the country, he can't simply pretend the parts of the government he doesn't like don't exist.
> Despite what HN believes, the NSA isn't a criminal enterprise
Just curious, how much of the constitution would the NSA have to violate for you to consider its actions illegal? Maybe if its employees engaged in intimidation of journalists, or lying under oath? Or would they need to burn a flag and strangle a bald eagle?
I do consider its actions illegal, but I don't consider the agency illegal. I'm also not a member of the US government, though, so even if I wanted to see the NSA burned to the ground, it wouldn't really be relevant.
For a senator, much less a theoretical president, not having a close relationship with intelligence agencies really isn't an option, especially if he intends to change or reform them.
> I do consider its actions illegal, but I don't consider the agency illegal
So it's like a waste management company that's a front for Mafia activity like extortion and racketeering. The company isn't illegal, just the activities of a tiny fraction of its employees.
> What was violated? What has been done that is illegal?
The whole mass metadata surveillance program was illegal; what was violated was the Constitution, insofar as, even assuming that the government could Constitutionally act in the manner the executive did, such authority of the Government as a whole would rest on authorities granted to Congress under the Constitution, not to the executive independently.
Or have we already forgotten that the mass metadata surveillance program was ruled by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals to not have been authorized by the Patriot Act provisions the NSA relied on for it? [0]
You didn't really answer my question. Actually, you didn't answer it at all. Because I'm not very bright, can you please spell out, in very simple terms, what right was violated?
> SENATOR TOM COTTON: The program has been approved 40 times by 15 different, independent federal judges based on 36 years of Supreme Court precedent. It has been approved by two presidents of both parties. [0]
> You didn't really answer my question. Actually, you didn't answer it at all.
Yes, you asked two questions, and I answered both of them:
Q. What was violated?
A. The Constitution, in that even if the bulk metadata collection program did not intrude on reserved rights and therefore could Constitutionally be done by the government, it would require authorization by Congress for the Executive Branch to have authority to do it, and, although the Executive has claimed it was authorized by Section 215, it was not, as the Second Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled.
Q. What was done that was illegal?
A. The entire bulk metadata collection program, for the reasons stated above.
> Because I'm not very bright, can you please spell out, in very simple terms, what right was violated?
The most fundamental political right on which the entire American system is based: the right to popular sovereignty, that is, the right to a government in which each part of the government exercises only those powers assigned to it by the people (in the case of the US, either directly through the Constitution, or through acts of other parts of government themselves acting through their Constitutional powers.)
> that is, the right to a government in which each part of the government exercises only those powers assigned to it by the people (in the case of the US, either directly through the Constitution, or through acts of other parts of government themselves acting through their Constitutional powers.)
This is what I am confused about.
> SENATOR TOM COTTON: The program has been approved 40 times by 15 different, independent federal judges based on 36 years of Supreme Court precedent. It has been approved by two presidents of both parties.
I am not clear on this point. I am wondering if someone can explain to me where in the Constitution something was violated. According to the source I've linked a few times, I don't understand.
To be blunt, everyone seems to throw around "violated the Constitution" without ever citing the Constitution.
> What harm is there in hearing what they've got to say?
Having the justification for a program of this nature be a secret is not compatible with democracy. So if they have something to say they should tell it to The Washington Post.
Bernie Sanders seems like a great candidate, but I fear he is too reasonable and conciliatory to do what is necessary to properly reign in the entrenched interests of the military/intelligence industrial complex. At this point it seems like nothing short of a campaign of slash-and-burn against these agencies will get the job done, and it's going to take someone as "nutty" as a Paul to do it.