Because no one has ever heard of Drake College in Des Moines, Iowa? I’m thinking that were this happening at Harvard or Yale or Columbia the liberal media would be all over it.
Of course, if we had a liberal media they’d be all over this story already. 
GW is not a Federal judge, the last time I checked. Nor is he a prosecutor. Nor is his name mentioned in the article. At all. You are, once again, indulging in your GWB fetish. It is getting unhealthy, don’t you think? Not every waking thought need be of the President, you know. Come on, admit it, come 2008, you morons are going to miss him. Who else will you simple idiots be able to fixate on, day in and day out?
In regards to this somewhat amusing story, Sic Semper Hippies.
Well, there you have it. Even the dumbest Bushie on the board will only go as far as a “Bush didn’t do” defense.
Step one: Pretend that you are not a fucking moron. Just for moment!
Step two: Reread your post. Three or four times, if need be.
Result Now you see just how stupid your idiotic blurb sounds!
Brutus-
Step one: Take your fist, and extend your thumb upwards as if to give a hearty thumbs up.
Step two: Insert it firmly in your ass.
Step three: Spin around until you fall down and realize what a fuckwit you are.
You are quite right, Brutus. I failed to consider the possibility that there might be Bushies dumber than you on the board. If there are any, I’d like to hear from them, too.
On a more serious note, the following may be useful in understanding what’s going on:
I emailed the link along with a short comment to
I hope you all do something similar. :mad:
If the grand jury’s subpoena power is indeed being used to stifle legitimate political protest, then that’s absolutely outrageous.
The fact that political protestors are being targeted certainly gives strength to that inference.
However, there may be something we don’t know. If, for example, the feds had interviewed an Afghani Al-Queda member last year, and if that person had revealed that Al-Queda was using “peace organizations in Des Moines” as a cover to raise and launder money, then I’d feel the investigation was justified.
I think the ACLU comment was right on the money: it’s best not to speculate, but rather wait and see what course of inquiry the grand jury takes. If they start asking the leaders of these groups if they ever sent money overseas to terrorist groups, I’d say that’s a legitimate inquiry into a federal crime, and the absolute correct use of a federal grand jury. If they merely ask, “What are the names of everyone in your group that supposedly favors ‘peace’, and why do you hate the United States?” then I would agree that this was an improper and illegal use of the grand jury process.
Bricker: Given A) that we will never see the results of the testimony, and thusly will never know if this is just intimidation, and B) The last time we didn’t speculate and waited and saw, we invaded someone on false premises, how much more credit are you willing to give the administration? That’s not rhetorical: what kind of actions that may still be justifiable will you concede are probably naked power politics?
Who or what is “am”? What is his/her/its function at CNN?
ante meridiem
More specifically, it is the CNN morning show - American Morning with Soledad O’Brien and Bill Hemmer.
Simply astounding. So…what, he’s gonna play McCarthy for a while now?
Is this a highly-rated show?
I wonder if it might be useful if we complied a list of email addresses of the highest-rated news shows and urged each other to email them about this news story.
Hell, not just the highest-rated, but maybe all of them.
An excellent and very fair question.
Answer: not too much, actually. My “what-if” scenario is a collection of ad-hoc assumptions. Absent even a sliver of actual evidence in support of them, I’d say my reaction is pretty far over against this tactic right now.
However, the ACLU’s lawyers, representing at least one of the subpoened witnesses, will be in much better shape to assess the situation after the grand jury appearance and move to quash the subpoena if the facts warrant it.
And regardless, that’s the right approach. The remedy to an overreaching grand jury investigation for ANY reason is a motion to quash. So that’s what I’d be recommending in any event.
I think that the highest rated news shows are NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, CNN, and MSNBC.
Might want to hold off on the emails for a day or so. The Washington Post picked up the story yesterday and most of the media types will see the story there. Also, the students are to testify tomorrow, so more information may be coming soon.
Have you ever given money to a terrorist organization? Don’t bother saying No. Just turn over all of your records for the last twenty years, including bank statements, tax returns, travel documents, telephone logs, and anything else we’re not remembering but that we’ll accuse you of holding back if you don’t include them. And you don’t get to talk to an attorney, either, or anybody else, for that matter. If you tell anybody at all about our investigation, the consequences will be dire. No, no, no, just shut up and comply.
Verily, this is the Land of the Free. :rolleyes:
Except that it is too reactive to be effective against spurious charges brought for purposes of intimidation or quelling of dissent. By the time a motion to quash can even be made there will have been real damages to the people against whom the state levvied these charges. Some jail time at the very least, being branded a “suspected terrorist” or “under investigation by anti-terrorism agencies”. The list goes on and on. The real effects of this “overreaching grand jury investigation” can’t be remedied by a simple quashing. There are some crimes in which we shouldn’t even level accusations without a damn good reason(such as charges of child pornography or pedophilia, and I’d add terrorism/terror related activities). Those who make these accusations without reasonable grounds should face penalities. Being able to launch the accusation in and of itself is enough to damage freedom of speech. If such accusations are being made for political reasons then a motion to quash simply is not going to either stop future abuses or remedy the damages caused by the spurious accusations.
Enjoy,
Steven
I would hope so, but I just can’t help seeing this as a variant of the frog in the pan: Put two frogs in, and as you turn up the heat, tell each frog that you’re doing it to keep it safe from the other frog. Not only will they not struggle to get out, they’ll actually ask you to keep turning up the heat.
This is absolutely wrong. First of all, I have no idea how you figure that jail time would be involved. And testifying before a grand jury does not mean that you are the target of an investigation; indeed, it’s as likely that you’re a witness as a target. Finally, a motion to quash may be made at any time, to include before the testimony is required.
If the grand jury returns an indictment against anyone, only then would jail time be a possibility… but for the grand jury to return an indictment, they would have to have found probable cause that a crime was committed.