"While there may be some truth to that, the real criticism is about pursuing an activity that had no chance of success. How indicative of future policy decisions might that be?"

This, from a supporter of the man who, against all of the (then) current intelligence and military analysis, still invaded a soverign country and remains committed to continuing his original mistake.....

is simply astounding!

Shooter, my hat is off to you. The level of your absurdity is unmatched by any of our other regular rightwing loons - including The Major.

"But hey, preserving the fourth is certainly worth the loss of 3000 people. Not to worry."

The balance of your post notwithstanding, Dipfuck, the preservation of one of the basic tenets of our Bill of Rights most certainly is, and has been, worth the loss of 3000 people.

Isn't that what the Oath of Office for the office of President of the United States, the oath taken by all of our military officers says?

If not, what do you believe the phrase "will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic" alludes to?

Shooter? Parents?

It's long been suspected that someone crapped on a log and that the sun hatched him. Every day that goes by, it becomes clearer that this theory is correct.

The "wall" had nothing to do with it.

In order for the your "wall" to come into play, there had to be intelligence to share in the first place.

"And yes, I wear my pink belt in my hair when I'm not practicing. I'd love to show you how to kick a politico. ;-}"

Mamasan you are beaucoup dian cai dou.

Truf.

You're in the right church but the wrong pew.

AMC posts are down one street and to the left.

Cheers

"[sorry. I shouldn't have...but I just couldn't resist. :-D]"

Behave!!.....or you'll be cursed with the breath of ten thousand wolverines suffering from an overdose of garlic!

I'm not sure Glenn was calling for a reduction in ad homs as much as he was pleading for us to stay more on topic.

Oh! No worries about the pony. He's in the mail, as are the Hag's spoolies and Pedinska's flame retardant drawers (complete with trap door).

Thanks for your concern.

dian cai dau, adj (usually pronounced as dinky dow) = crazy

:->~

This is your lucky day!

The reason I say that is because your post complaining about GoodCelery is lodged at the hind end of a long thread which is about to become obsolete. You truly do not wish to have a go at GoodCelery. GC is the room's resident poet and there are good reasons why he posts as he does and those of us who have been around here for a while know those reasons. You should probably stiffle any urge to complain about him until such time as you have spent some time here.

Second..

No one asked you to leave.

Regards.

"If anything, allowing the Government to collect greater and greater amounts of surveillance data, with fewer and fewer safeguards, results in far less effective counter-terrorism efforts. As both Martin and Rep. Rush Holt have continuously pointed out, allowing the intelligence community to suck up whatever they want about Americans in some sort of blunderbuss vacuum cleaner effect, without safeguards, is far less likely to lead to the detection of actual threats than is focused, narrow, and managed intelligence-gathering activities. More safeguards and restrictions leads to better surveillance."

The only time such a "vacuum cleaner" approach would be beneficial is when the operater of the vacuum cleaner was able to determine which "dirt or debris" he wanted to see. In the real world of intelligence, that's not possible.

It is possible, however, when the operator of the vacuum cleaner is able to point the machine at whatever debris he chooses, even if the "debris" in question is merely a domestic political enemy.

In the real world, events drive intelligence, not the other way around and the events which took place during the summer of 2001, prior to the 9-11 attacks, should have driven our intelligence gathering apparatus.

Having said all that, my question is why did Mukasey drop this little turd into the punchbowl? Surely he knows that FISA didn't compromise our ability to surveil a call such as he described and surely he knew that his allegation would be delved into and determined to be false. If he merely desired to convince an audience of the righteousness of his cause, he could have (after the fact) claimed that his reference was

merely hypothetical albeit crafted so as to be taken as literally true. Why would the AG deepen his original lie at this stage of the game?

Is this administration still so confident of their ability to drive Congress that they don't care if they are found to be liars and if so, why would Mukasey flush an otherwise fine professional reputation down the toilet on behalf of an administration which is on its last legs?

The more I read on this entire subject, the more I am inclined to believe that it's not only the administration's political enemies who have been "turned", but that there are some higherups within the administration who are, for one reason or another, unable to challenge their bosses.

"So now you presume to know how much time I spend here?"

Not at all but there are two options to consider here.

(1) Those who have spent any time here at all would know about GC and would know that to complain about his posting would generate a negative response.

(2) Those who have spent time here and still complain about him are probably just morons.

I was giving you the benefit of doubt and being nice about it but that seems to have failed.

No more being nice and no more benefit of doubt.

Have a nice day, JulieAnna.

I tried.

Let her hang herself if that's what she desires.

Some people are just plain thick.