15 ms·

Terror Watch List Finally Reined In

81 points by Anon84 7y ago

baybal2 7y ago
I congratulate whomever fought it, the biggest infringement of fundamental rights in a plain daylight in the free world. I say it from a place completely antipodal from the free world. People who live in totalitarian states still look up to you, America, even in your current state of unending downward spiraling. Think, if America in it current state is still kept in such esteem, and still though of as a "moral etalon," think just how much you still have to loose, and how deep is the abyss your country is edging on.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  > the biggest infringement of fundamental rights in a plain daylight in the free world. Guantanamo Bay ring a bell?
  - baybal2 7y ago
    I think it will be a close second along with domestic espionage
  - teh_klev 7y ago
    If you ask me as a European citizen (well until Halloween maybe :/) to suggest areas problematic to human rights with regard to the US then Guantanamo is in my top five. But then I'm 52 and watched on TV Blair and Bush (aided by a compliant press) crowing about the use of "Gitmo" as a place where captured "combatants" were going to unlearn their ways....forever. Some of the captives have been in that shithole getting on for eighteen years now with no hope of a fair trial. So I think for a lot of folks Guantanamo does ring a fairly loud bell.
    - blacksmith_tb 7y ago
      It's clearly disgusting, but the total number of Guantanamo inmates seems to be 779[1]. The watch list had 1.2M names on it, so not be too utilitarian, but it seems like a pretty significant difference in terms of the number of people impacted (if not the severity). 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp#Prisoners https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp#...
      - jacquesm 7y ago
        Putting people on a list vs putting them in perpetual detention without a trial is on an entirely different level of moral failure.
        teh_klev 7y ago
        I agree, but they're both important moral failures that should be challenged. Here's a wee anecdote. When I was in my teens and early twenties (read that as late 80's) I was an active member of CND, the SNP and Scotland Out of NATO. I was active in the NUS (National Union of Students) as well and even organised a protest and student strike at my Scottish shithole of a college in Perth - having managed to drum up around 400 students to march upon the Tory offices in Perth to demonstrate against cuts to student grants and burseries. During this time I was never arrested or apprehended by the Police. In fact I've never been arrested or apprehended and as far as I know don't have a criminal or civil violation record (except maybe a handful of traffic violations - speeding, and a driving without due care and attention when I was 26 [reading my map]). After I left college, and despite being qualified for many jobs, the interviews came and went over around 6-7 years and I wondered why? Until it came to light there was an organisation called the Economic League[0] which manually compiled lists of UK activists and fed them to many organisations as a form of blacklisting. Whilst I was never able to establish that I might have been on their list, I had a fairly strong suspicion, with hindsight, I was listed. There's no way that the sort of jobs I was applying for, where right up until the last minute, the offers were withdrawn with no explanation. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_League_(United_Kingdom) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_League_(United_Kingdo...
    - gamblor956 7y ago
      Some of the Guantanamo trials resulted in acquittals and charges being dropped against the defendant, with these defendants subsequently being released. Contrast that with the standard European model of criminal jurisprudence, in which the judge deciding the case is frequently also the prosecutor, and there is no panel of jurors, and no threshold of proof.
      - megous 7y ago
        I've just read this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murat_Kurnaz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murat_Kurnaz And what are you even talking about?
      - jacquesm 7y ago
        I have a very hard time reconciling your view of the 'European model of criminal jurisprudence' (which is an interesting word salad by itself) with what I know of how the criminal prosecutions work in the various European countries. Let's just say that your view is incorrect. Judges are not typically prosecutors. And no, we usually do not have panels of jurors but consider that a good thing.
  - gamblor956 7y ago
    What fundamental rights did Guantanamo Bay violate? The prisoners kept there were picked up after attacks on US/Allied forces on battlefields or in areas immediately adjacent. Non-state combatants are not protected by the Geneva Convention, and the treatment of non-state prisoners was historically battlefield execution. Some of the (innocent) noncombatants were released after investigation. The remaining purported noncombatants chose to boycott their trials.
    - megous 7y ago
      Some were decided to be innocent, and held up and tortured for years afterwards, because there was "nowhere" to release them. Of course it would be easy to release them to US if other countries refused. But instead of that US rather kept innocents locked up for years, out of convenience or whatever. I think continued detention after you're determined to be innocent, is quite bad. Also if I make a mistake and lock you up and torture you for years, just releaseing you is not really justice. Is it really that hard to read up a wikipedia page on Guantanamo bay for americans, if not a book or two? There's enough info just on wikipedia's main article and some linked articles from there to make your skin crawl.
- turk73 7y ago
  Not sure why the downvotes for you. Our bureaucrats are doing their best to make us lose our way but each day is a new fight. Red Flag laws are the latest affront--politically target people whom you don't like using police SWAT teams, basically legalized SWAT-ing without due process. Something to be aware of: Even when the courts strike down these laws, government often does not comply at all. Secret lists? I'm sure they have many and if they don't, they hire private firms or use foreign intelligence agencies to circumvent the law.
- einpoklum 7y ago
  > the biggest infringement of fundamental rights in a plain daylight Aren't you forgetting about those lovely drone assassinations by presidential fiat?
- tick_tock_tick 7y ago
  I beg to differ it going to be very hard to top when Obama ordered an extra extrajudicial killings of a US citizen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki.
  - baybal2 7y ago
    Imagine, a socio-racial profiling blacklist impacting 1m+ people, a double percentage of whom are your own citizens by birth, who grew up and live in US, and a murder of one very unlucky Yemeni family. Of course both are reprehensible
  - mav3rick 7y ago
    He seems like an out and out terrorist. Easy to write something like this when you haven't lost a loved one to a terrorist attack.
    - tick_tock_tick 7y ago
      Then at least preform a trial in absentia rather than just putting them on the kill list.
    - saagarjha 7y ago
      The point of a trial is to have a better justification than your feeling of him being "an out and out terrorist".
      - mav3rick 7y ago
        There is no feeling. He was clearly planning things. And the govt may have got a confidential order from a judge.
        brokenmachine 7y ago
        I'm curious, would a secret order from a judge remain secret after his death? Forever?
diminoten 7y ago
Man, I really need to keep better watch out for opinion pieces. Not that I disagree with this guy, but I'm looking for information, not moralization. Here's a NYT news article about the subject: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04/us/politics/terrorism-watchlist-constitution.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04/us/politics/terrorism-wat...
- ergothus 7y ago
  I feel that as parties have learned how to abuse the "neutrality" of the media, a lot of real reporting has moved to the opinions section. ...where it mingles with content that clearly belongs in the opinion section and away from "news". This creates a real problem - if people who want to know if any claim is TRUE rather than just hearing the claims of the various parties to a dispute, they move to these opinion sections (and opinion organizations). This gives the credibility of objective reporting to those that aren't even claiming to be objective. I want my reporting to mention when something isn't proven...but also to not be victims of battles over the Overton window.
bediger4000 7y ago
After only 17 years or so. The watch list was unconstitutional on its face, there were no criteria how to get on it, and no no-opaque way to get off it (violating the petition for redress of grievances clause). It was also un-American in spirit. Secret lists enforced by secret police in secret. Rubbish. George Washington would be ashamed.
- TomMckenny 7y ago
  What's most disturbing is that it took 17 years. And whatever it is in the culture that uses liberty to zealously oppose regulation of fire arms and corporations but lets this stand for almost a generation. It'd be interesting to learn how these priorities came about.
  - mieseratte 7y ago
    You wonder how these priorities came about? Do you not recall 9/11 or are you not an American? Scared people do irrational things.
    - mindslight 7y ago
      "Scared people do irrational things" makes it sound as if the overall reaction was somehow reasonable at the time or that the priorities were organic. Most of the fear and panic was stoked by the mainstream media, in support of traitorous politicians seeing an opportunity to act on longstanding totalitarian wishes. Propaganda is a powerful weapon against Free people.
      - Fnoord 7y ago
        If the end goal of the terrorists was forcing the West into a more totalitarian, less free society, then they succeeded.
    - SamReidHughes 7y ago
      A terror watch list or a no-fly list isn't irrational at all. It's sensible in principle, if you don't value civil rights that much.
einpoklum 7y ago
They should just replace the terror watch list with the CIA payroll list + list of foreign donors to Washington think-tanks and their extended family members. I suspect that would increase the accuracy marvelously.
- misterprime 7y ago
  Hah! Would we still get to watch them on TV news?
yspeak 7y ago
A little early to be so excited. Just one district Court judge who hasv n agenda. And it would be good if comments focused on what search and seizure, due process,law actually is rather than what one wishes it to be. Being barred from flying is not equivalent to being jailed particularly when safety of rest of plane is called considered.
ilaksh 7y ago
Great. What website do I go to to make sure I'm not on the list?
- chopin 7y ago
  There are websites you don't go to not get on the list...

81 points by Anon84 7y ago

I congratulate whomever fought it, the biggest infringement of fundamental rights in a plain daylight in the free world. I say it from a place completely antipodal from the free world. People who live in totalitarian states still look up to you, America, even in your current state of unending downward spiraling. Think, if America in it current state is still kept in such esteem, and still though of as a "moral etalon," think just how much you still have to loose, and how deep is the abyss your country is edging on.

jacquesm 7y ago
> the biggest infringement of fundamental rights in a plain daylight in the free world. Guantanamo Bay ring a bell?
- baybal2 7y ago
  I think it will be a close second along with domestic espionage
- teh_klev 7y ago
  If you ask me as a European citizen (well until Halloween maybe :/) to suggest areas problematic to human rights with regard to the US then Guantanamo is in my top five. But then I'm 52 and watched on TV Blair and Bush (aided by a compliant press) crowing about the use of "Gitmo" as a place where captured "combatants" were going to unlearn their ways....forever. Some of the captives have been in that shithole getting on for eighteen years now with no hope of a fair trial. So I think for a lot of folks Guantanamo does ring a fairly loud bell.
  - blacksmith_tb 7y ago
    It's clearly disgusting, but the total number of Guantanamo inmates seems to be 779[1]. The watch list had 1.2M names on it, so not be too utilitarian, but it seems like a pretty significant difference in terms of the number of people impacted (if not the severity). 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp#Prisoners https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp#...
    - jacquesm 7y ago
      Putting people on a list vs putting them in perpetual detention without a trial is on an entirely different level of moral failure.
      - teh_klev 7y ago
        I agree, but they're both important moral failures that should be challenged. Here's a wee anecdote. When I was in my teens and early twenties (read that as late 80's) I was an active member of CND, the SNP and Scotland Out of NATO. I was active in the NUS (National Union of Students) as well and even organised a protest and student strike at my Scottish shithole of a college in Perth - having managed to drum up around 400 students to march upon the Tory offices in Perth to demonstrate against cuts to student grants and burseries. During this time I was never arrested or apprehended by the Police. In fact I've never been arrested or apprehended and as far as I know don't have a criminal or civil violation record (except maybe a handful of traffic violations - speeding, and a driving without due care and attention when I was 26 [reading my map]). After I left college, and despite being qualified for many jobs, the interviews came and went over around 6-7 years and I wondered why? Until it came to light there was an organisation called the Economic League[0] which manually compiled lists of UK activists and fed them to many organisations as a form of blacklisting. Whilst I was never able to establish that I might have been on their list, I had a fairly strong suspicion, with hindsight, I was listed. There's no way that the sort of jobs I was applying for, where right up until the last minute, the offers were withdrawn with no explanation. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_League_(United_Kingdom) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_League_(United_Kingdo...
  - gamblor956 7y ago
    Some of the Guantanamo trials resulted in acquittals and charges being dropped against the defendant, with these defendants subsequently being released. Contrast that with the standard European model of criminal jurisprudence, in which the judge deciding the case is frequently also the prosecutor, and there is no panel of jurors, and no threshold of proof.
    - megous 7y ago
      I've just read this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murat_Kurnaz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murat_Kurnaz And what are you even talking about?
    - jacquesm 7y ago
      I have a very hard time reconciling your view of the 'European model of criminal jurisprudence' (which is an interesting word salad by itself) with what I know of how the criminal prosecutions work in the various European countries. Let's just say that your view is incorrect. Judges are not typically prosecutors. And no, we usually do not have panels of jurors but consider that a good thing.
- gamblor956 7y ago
  What fundamental rights did Guantanamo Bay violate? The prisoners kept there were picked up after attacks on US/Allied forces on battlefields or in areas immediately adjacent. Non-state combatants are not protected by the Geneva Convention, and the treatment of non-state prisoners was historically battlefield execution. Some of the (innocent) noncombatants were released after investigation. The remaining purported noncombatants chose to boycott their trials.
  - megous 7y ago
    Some were decided to be innocent, and held up and tortured for years afterwards, because there was "nowhere" to release them. Of course it would be easy to release them to US if other countries refused. But instead of that US rather kept innocents locked up for years, out of convenience or whatever. I think continued detention after you're determined to be innocent, is quite bad. Also if I make a mistake and lock you up and torture you for years, just releaseing you is not really justice. Is it really that hard to read up a wikipedia page on Guantanamo bay for americans, if not a book or two? There's enough info just on wikipedia's main article and some linked articles from there to make your skin crawl.
turk73 7y ago
Not sure why the downvotes for you. Our bureaucrats are doing their best to make us lose our way but each day is a new fight. Red Flag laws are the latest affront--politically target people whom you don't like using police SWAT teams, basically legalized SWAT-ing without due process. Something to be aware of: Even when the courts strike down these laws, government often does not comply at all. Secret lists? I'm sure they have many and if they don't, they hire private firms or use foreign intelligence agencies to circumvent the law.
einpoklum 7y ago
> the biggest infringement of fundamental rights in a plain daylight Aren't you forgetting about those lovely drone assassinations by presidential fiat?
tick_tock_tick 7y ago
I beg to differ it going to be very hard to top when Obama ordered an extra extrajudicial killings of a US citizen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki.
- baybal2 7y ago
  Imagine, a socio-racial profiling blacklist impacting 1m+ people, a double percentage of whom are your own citizens by birth, who grew up and live in US, and a murder of one very unlucky Yemeni family. Of course both are reprehensible
- mav3rick 7y ago
  He seems like an out and out terrorist. Easy to write something like this when you haven't lost a loved one to a terrorist attack.
  - tick_tock_tick 7y ago
    Then at least preform a trial in absentia rather than just putting them on the kill list.
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    The point of a trial is to have a better justification than your feeling of him being "an out and out terrorist".
    - mav3rick 7y ago
      There is no feeling. He was clearly planning things. And the govt may have got a confidential order from a judge.
      - brokenmachine 7y ago
        I'm curious, would a secret order from a judge remain secret after his death? Forever?

diminoten 7y ago

Man, I really need to keep better watch out for opinion pieces. Not that I disagree with this guy, but I'm looking for information, not moralization. Here's a NYT news article about the subject: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04/us/politics/terrorism-watchlist-constitution.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04/us/politics/terrorism-wat...

ergothus 7y ago
I feel that as parties have learned how to abuse the "neutrality" of the media, a lot of real reporting has moved to the opinions section. ...where it mingles with content that clearly belongs in the opinion section and away from "news". This creates a real problem - if people who want to know if any claim is TRUE rather than just hearing the claims of the various parties to a dispute, they move to these opinion sections (and opinion organizations). This gives the credibility of objective reporting to those that aren't even claiming to be objective. I want my reporting to mention when something isn't proven...but also to not be victims of battles over the Overton window.

bediger4000 7y ago

After only 17 years or so. The watch list was unconstitutional on its face, there were no criteria how to get on it, and no no-opaque way to get off it (violating the petition for redress of grievances clause). It was also un-American in spirit. Secret lists enforced by secret police in secret. Rubbish. George Washington would be ashamed.

TomMckenny 7y ago
What's most disturbing is that it took 17 years. And whatever it is in the culture that uses liberty to zealously oppose regulation of fire arms and corporations but lets this stand for almost a generation. It'd be interesting to learn how these priorities came about.
- mieseratte 7y ago
  You wonder how these priorities came about? Do you not recall 9/11 or are you not an American? Scared people do irrational things.
  - mindslight 7y ago
    "Scared people do irrational things" makes it sound as if the overall reaction was somehow reasonable at the time or that the priorities were organic. Most of the fear and panic was stoked by the mainstream media, in support of traitorous politicians seeing an opportunity to act on longstanding totalitarian wishes. Propaganda is a powerful weapon against Free people.
    - Fnoord 7y ago
      If the end goal of the terrorists was forcing the West into a more totalitarian, less free society, then they succeeded.
  - SamReidHughes 7y ago
    A terror watch list or a no-fly list isn't irrational at all. It's sensible in principle, if you don't value civil rights that much.

einpoklum 7y ago

They should just replace the terror watch list with the CIA payroll list + list of foreign donors to Washington think-tanks and their extended family members. I suspect that would increase the accuracy marvelously.

misterprime 7y ago
Hah! Would we still get to watch them on TV news?

yspeak 7y ago

A little early to be so excited. Just one district Court judge who hasv n agenda. And it would be good if comments focused on what search and seizure, due process,law actually is rather than what one wishes it to be. Being barred from flying is not equivalent to being jailed particularly when safety of rest of plane is called considered.

ilaksh 7y ago

Great. What website do I go to to make sure I'm not on the list?

chopin 7y ago
There are websites you don't go to not get on the list...