An email from Nation magazine alerted me to the opportunity to sign this birthday card for President Obama. So what sort of greetings should I give to Barack? “May federal judges continue helping cover up your crimes!” “May the Washington media (mostly) continue groveling at your feet…” The dude’s birthday is on August 4 […]
Tag Archives | Obama
Three Cheers for Justin Amash and the Anti-Spying Coalition
Three cheers for Rep. Justin Amash and colleagues who came within a whisker of reining in the NSA’s illegal surveillance tonight in Congress! (Final vote on his amendment was 217 to 205). This is a huge moral victory – and the sign of civil liberty victories to come. And the floor debate helped reveal […]
Wash. Times: AmeriCorps’ National Service Charade
Washington Times, July 18, 2013 BOVARD: AmeriCorps’ national service charade Paying youths to push big government makes a mockery of volunteerism by James Bovard At a White House ceremony Monday, President Obama announced a Task Force on Expanding National Service. He is jumping onto a popular bandwagon: Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson recently promised that […]
Obama’s Vacuum Cleaner for Your Health Data
Here’s a piece I wrote in 2009 on one of Obama’s first assaults on privacy. A few of the piece’s punchier lines: *Privacy is very lucrative for the Beltway boys: they reap millions when they betray it. *We now know that psychologists were brought to the prison at Guantánamo to exploit detainees’ weaknesses for interrogation […]
N.Y. Times Snares Secret FISA Court Decrees – Fresh Hell for NSA and Obama
The New York Times published a long article today on secret rulings by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The article describes the FISA court as “almost a parallel Supreme Court” which has cast aside traditional understandings of privacy and the Fourth Amendment. Reading between the lines, it is clear that NYT has the actual decisions…. […]
Fiery Thomas Drake Speech from July 4 NSA Rally
Kevin Gosztola has posted the NBC video of Thomas Drake’s excellent speech from yesterday’s anti-surveillance rally. Here’s the spiel:
The Voting Rights Mirage
The Washington Times, July 3, 2013 BOVARD: The voting rights mirage Satisfied to cast ballots, Americans stand idle while other freedoms are ravished by James Bovard Liberals are aghast at the Supreme Court ruling last week that struck down a key provision of the Voting Rights Act. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg denounced the […]