3 ms·
> If you believe that there is never a need for law enforcement decisions to be made that cannot be revealed to the accused party, then that is a separate (and
by ccooffee 3y ago
> If you believe that there is never a need for law enforcement decisions to be made that cannot be revealed to the accused party, then that is a separate (and in my opinion, impractical/unreal) point.
Well, uhh, thanks for inviting a "genuine intellectual debate" and then out-of-hand dismissing any disagreements as "impractical/unreal".
We already have the grand jury which is a secret process and can deliver so called "sealed indictments" which prevents the indicted party from knowing they have been indicted. Grand juries have significant oversight and a long history of legal oversight.
FISA "courts", on the other hand, operate in an intentionally ill-defined legal space. To me, FISA courts are just as nonsense as the "unlawful enemy combatant" Bush-era policies. "This system is not _technically_ against the law because we built-in enough loopholes to prevent any actual legal oversight" should not be a valid argument for upholding a corrupt status-quo.
I don't accept the premise that some information is _too dangerous_ to be heard by a grand jury. We already have legal processes to limit exposure, including many trial processes that are done without the jury being present.
- pclmulqdq 3y agoGrand juries are sworn to secrecy already, with pretty strict penalties if that secrecy is broken. There is no reason that this can't apply to so-called "Top Secret" information (a label that is already applied far too liberally) if you run a background check on them. Over a million people have a TS-level clearance already. Grand juries would add another few hundred. People who like the FISA court want that grand jury to have the powers of a court. This is ridiculous.