'Bush's 4th term' (Got To Blame Bush!)

Politico ^ | June 6, 2013 | Glenn Thrush

[Pinkbell]

The outrage over President Barack Obama’s authorization of a nearly limitless federal dive into Americans’ phone records obscures a hiding-in-plain-sight truth about the 44th president many of his supporters have overlooked for years:

For all his campaign-trail talk of running the “most transparent administration” in U.S history, Obama never promised to reverse the 43rd president’s policies on domestic anti-terrorism surveillance — and he’s been good on his word.

Obama’s effort to strike what he’s repeatedly called “a balance” between personal liberty and homeland security has exposed what amounts to a split political personality: Candidate Obama often spoke about personal freedom with the passion of a constitutional lawyer — while Commander-in-Chief Obama has embraced and expanded Bush-era surveillance efforts like the 2011 extension of the Patriot Act, which paved the way for a secret court order allowing the gathering of Verizon phone records.

In an irony now being savored by his conservative critics, Obama administration officials are now relying on Republicans to defend him against charges from liberals and the libertarian right that he’s recklessly prioritized national security over personal liberty.

“Drone strikes. Wiretaps. Gitmo. Renditions. Military commissions. Obama is carrying out Bush’s fourth term, yet he attacked Bush for violating the Constitution,” said Ari Fleischer, George W. Bush’s press secretary.

“He’s helping keep the nation safe, vindicating President Bush, all while putting a bipartisan stamp on how to fight terror,” Fleischer added.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) defended the record-grab Thursday, publicly urging Attorney General Eric Holder to stay the course even if some corrections needed to be made.

“You keep up what you’re doing,” Graham said. “President Bush started it. President Obama’s continuing it. We need it, from my point of view.”

[Pinkbell]

The goal is to link this to Bush in the public's mind.

[Cowboy Bob]

Bush started it, but Obama corrupted it.

[Berlin_Freeper]

Bush is an easy target because he never comes out and says anything. Democrats take advantage of that by pinning everything on him.

[VeniVidiVici]

Obama ran on a campaign promise to “end it”.

He lied.

[Fresh Wind]

Bush is an easy target because he never comes out and says anything.

And that applies to the 8 years he was president, and every day since he left office.

[funfan]

Exactly and they had video with him doing just that all over the news today I guess politico was busy refilling their Kool-Aid glass that they missed it.

Even Shepard Smith is pissed off and he was pissed at Obama.

[funfan]

“while Commander-in-Chief Obama has embraced and expanded Bush-era surveillance efforts like the 2011 extension of the Patriot Act, which paved the way for a secret court order allowing the gathering of Verizon phone records.”

Looks like Obama to me and the congress via the extension in 2011.

[RginTN]

I guess Obama isn’t president. He never got elected. So I can blame Bush for offing Bin laden then!

[urbanpovertylawcenter]

I think the bigger question and the real scandal, given that the Obama administration is a criminal enterprise as witnessed by the series of scandals just coming to light, what the hell happened to the 4 trillion dollars of deficit spending?

Follow the money find the crime.

The harassment of Americans by the nimrod bureaus is small potatoes, compared to the illegal raid on our sovereign treasury.

Congress, who is watching the till?

[EBH]

When Democrats retook control of Congress in 2006, promising to investigate the administration's counterterrorism policies, Bush administration officials moved to formalize court oversight of the NSA programs, according to former U.S. officials.

(democrat)Congress in 2006 also made changes to the Patriot Act that made it easier for the government to collect phone-subscriber data under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Those changes helped the NSA collection program become institutionalized, rather than one conducted only under the authority of the president, said people familiar with the program.

Along with the TSP, the NSA collection of phone company customer data was put under the jurisdiction of a secret court that oversees the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, according to officials. U.S. Collects Vast Data Trove

Now here is where this gets good...and damn it...they are hiding from it. I apologize, but this is from Wiki and you have to read through a lot of garbage type stuff to get to it...and how Bush signed it etc. in July 2008, but I think these last few lines are pertinent. LOOK AT THE DATES. This was just after the elections of 2008, on the eve of the democrats getting total power...

In February 2008, the Senate passed the version of the new FISA that would allow telecom companies immunity. On March 13, 2008, the U.S. House of Representatives held a secret session to discuss related information. On March 14, the House voted 213-197 to approve a bill that would not grant telecom immunity — far short of the 2/3 majority required to override a Presidential veto.[51] The Senate and House bills are compared and contrasted in a June 12, 2008 report from the Congressional Research Service.[52]

On the evening of November 11, 2008, the House of Representatives held a secret, closed door meeting to debate changes to the FISA bill.[53][54]

Something's Fishy

Wait,,,,what....secret meeting to debate secret changes to the the FISA bill? What bill? And who ultimately signed those changes? Obama or Bush?

[EBH]

Yeah...there was a secret session, but it was 3/2008, not post election.

[plangent]

Under Bush the surveil was with foreign-domestic traffic. Under Obama the surveil included domestic-domestic traffic.

Put this together with Homeland Security’s massive clean out purchases of ammo, and the picture shifts to fear of the masses.

[ballplayer]

If these frauds in the media are so upset,let’s see how long they continue to kiss his ass.It only took the New York Times a couple hours before they got over their,ahem, anger,before they corrected their editorial from Obama has lost all credibility,to Obama has lost all credibility on this issue.
What a joke

[motor_racer]

Government is too big, too powerful, too intrusive, too arrogant. No one, as in NO ONE, can be or should be trusted with power of this sort.

This solution is not to put someone else in charge, but to remove the power.

[NotYourAverageDhimmi]

Blame Bush Syndrome is a serious malady. An Obama supporter I know was complaining about the phone record seizures. I mentioned the New York Times editorial saying that Obama has “lost all credibility on this issue.” The Obama supporter instantly went into “It’s been going on since 9/11” mode. I then pointed out that Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein said the wide spread phone record seizures started in 2009 (see link). It won’t matter to the Obama supporter. It’s still Bush’s fault.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/06/18796204-nsa-snooping-has-foiled-multiple-terror-plots-feinstein

[napscoordinator]

For as bad as President Bush was to this administration, they sure do follow his policies big time. Obama must not think Bush did that bad a job after all.

[Vinnie]

Wasn’t Project Echelon revealed under Slick Willie?
Brits spied on us, we spied on their citizens and then the info was exchanged.
Covered primarily calls to domestic-foreign calls.

[odawg]

...”most transparent administration”

the only transparency in this administration is the presidential teleprompter.

[techcor]

Someone ought to mention the Carnivore system under the Clinton administration.

[Piranha]

People are forgetting that this government has identified Tea Partiers, gun control advocates and other conservatives as “terrorists”. When we read that the phone spying efforts were aimed at rooting out terrorists and their networks, I do not think that the government thinks that “terrorist” means what we think it means. I think that they wanted to monitor US calling patterns to identify conservatives and their allies.