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If John McCain, John Cornyn, Mitch McConnell, and the other Republican senators lashing into Rand Paul because of his efforts to force expiration of Sec. 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act had been alive and part of the debate back in 1775-76, they would have been blasting Patrick Henry for supporting Liberty. Colonialists McCain, Cornyn and McConnell would have been firmly in the Tory camp; defending the powers of the Crown to “protect” the colonialists through such tools as Writs of Assistance. Today, in this 21st Century, the tools may have changed, but the foundational principle on which our independence...

Tuesday in in Orlando at the Florida Economic Growth Summit, former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL) said he was “upset” and “deeply troubled” about the debate over the NSA encroaching upon American’s civil liberties by the warrantless collection of bulk data that has now been reformed by the Senate passing the Freedom Act. Bush said, “The simple fact is, we are safer today because of the Patriot Act, and this notion that somehow you create a false narrative, as many on the left, and a few on our team, but mostly on the left, that our civil liberties are being violated....

Of the Presidential candidates: Sanders - NO Rubio - NO Cruz - YES Graham - Did not vote

WASHINGTON — In a remarkable reversal of national security policy formed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the Senate voted on Tuesday to curtail the federal government’s sweeping surveillance of American phone records, sending the legislation to President Obama’s desk for his signature. The passage of the measure, achieved after a vigorous debate on the Senate floor, will lead to the reinstatement of government surveillance efforts that were blacked out on Monday after Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, blocked their extension. The vote was a rebuke to Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the majority leader, as...

A bill that would allow key government surveillance programs to resume for now – after they were temporarily suspended Sunday – cleared another hurdle in the Senate on Tuesday.

The Senate on Tuesday sent legislation reforming the nation’s surveillance laws to President Obama’s desk — days after a stalemate caused the National Security Agency’s powers to lapse. The vote for the USA Freedom Act came more than 36 hours after three parts of the Patriot Act expired, which caused the NSA to wind down its programs. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) suffered a political blow during the bruising fight over the USA Freedom Act, which he and other hawkish Republican senators opposed even after it was approved by the House in a broad, bipartisan vote. Senate Minority Leader...

The Senate has rejected all three controversial amendments from Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to legislation reforming the National Security Agency (NSA), edging closer to sending the bill to President Obama's desk. The first amendment from McConnell, rejected in a 42-56 vote, would have changed the structure of a new expert panel created by the USA Freedom Act to weigh in one some matters before the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which oversees spying matters. The second amendment, rejected in a 44-54 vote, would have delayed the transition time for the NSA to end its phone records program from six...

The relationship between Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell has always been more a marriage of political convenience than heartfelt bromance, and it is being tested now like never before.. The two Republican senators represent divergent flanks of the Republican Party, often pulling in different directions, most recently over what to do with the nation’s domestic telephone surveillance program. Paul is the libertarian-leaning firebrand who temporarily shut down the government's bulk collection of Americans’ phone records. McConnell, the Senate majority leader, is the establishment elder who believes surveillance is not infringing on privacy and should be preserved to catch terrorists. Paul...

The pages were blacked out by the Bush administration on national security grounds. “We cannot let page after page of blanked-out documents be obscured by a veil,” Paul said at a packed Capitol press conference on Tuesday, flanked by fellow lawmakers and families of victims of the 2001 attack. “We owe it to these families, and we cannot let this lack of transparency erode trust and make us feel less secure.” For years, Jones and other lawmakers have been fighting for the release of the pages, which are believed to paint senior officials within Saudi Arabia as complicit in the...

Sen. Ted Cruz is polling better against Hillary Clinton, but not against the people he’d need to beat to face her. Cruz gained ground on the former secretary of state in a CNN/ORC poll released Tuesday trailing her 52 percent to 43 percent in a hypothetical 2016 match-up. The nine-point gap is a major improvement from the 24-point Cruz lost by in a mid-April poll. But Cruz only gained one point on his primary competition in a poll of Republicans and GOP-leaning independents, inching from seven to eight points. Clinton’s polling in favorability, trustworthiness and empathy also tanked, so this...

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, the main author of the original Patriot Act, wrote an op-ed in 2013 explaining the NSA bulk collection of data belonging to Americans is an abuse of the legislation. In particular, Sensenbrenner slammed the Obama administration for abusing the Patriot Act in order to collect phone call information of all Americans, despite any ties to terrorism. Last week, the Guardian reported that the Obama administration is collecting records of every call made to, from or within the US, as well as records of many digital communications. President Obama has tried to deflect criticism by claiming "every member...

Trading liberty for a false sense of security? No thanks. Well done, Rand Paul. The faster we rid ourselves of the Patriot Act, the better The Constitution matters. It’s a simple as that. If you want to live in a free and open society, you don’t spend your time and effort chipping away at the bill of rights. Usually, that’s the battle-cry of small government conservatives. Today, for some reason, that’s changed. Today, Republicans are admonishing constitutionalists for their stubborn refusal to “sacrifice liberty” for a false sense of security. Among them is my colleague, Dan Calabrese, whose column you...

---snip--- Sen. Rand Paul is in step with his party on most issues. He’s pro-life, a big backer of gun rights, a small-government conservative and he’s an unabashed critic of President Obama and Hillary Clinton. And yet, Paul is again in the spotlight talking about his disagreements with his own party. For months, Paul has been focused on reducing criminal penalties for drugs. Last week, he blamed GOP hawks for the creation of ISIS. Now, he has succeeded in pulling off a one-man blockade of the Patriot Act. Like his other views, Paul’s stand is no doubt sincere and he...

The legal authority for several national security programs expired at midnight Sunday and will not be renewed for at least two days, after Senate Republicans leaders were unable to maneuver around Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a presidential candidate who followed through on a pledge to block an extension of the law. The Senate closed a rare Sunday session without approving the only legislation that would have averted a lapse in the authority — a House-passed bill that would provide for an orderly transition away from the most controversial program authorized under the current law: the National Security Agency’s bulk collection...

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul on Monday walked back his comments that some in Washington might be “secretly” hoping for a terrorist attack with the expiration of provisions of the PATRIOT Act, saying in an interview on Fox News that “hyperbole can get the better of anyone,” and that was what happened on the Senate floor on Sunday. “I think, sometimes, in the heat of battle, hyperbole can get the better of anyone, and that may be the problem there. The point I was trying to make is that I think people do use fear to try to get us to...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The National Security Agency lost its authority at midnight to collect Americans’ phone records in bulk, after GOP Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) stood in the way of extending the fiercely contested program in an extraordinary Sunday Senate session.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The National Security Agency lost its authority at midnight to collect Americans' phone records in bulk, after GOP Sen. Rand Paul stood in the way of extending the fiercely contested program in an extraordinary Sunday Senate session. But that program and several other post-Sept. 11 counter-terror measures look likely to be revived in a matter of days. With no other options, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, in an about-face, reluctantly embraced a House-passed bill that would extend the anti-terror provisions, while also remaking the bulk phone collections program. Although the lapse in the programs may be brief,...

Republican Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) faced off late Sunday afternoon, as the Kentucky Republican tried to speak from the Senate floor about expiring provisions of the Patriot Act. McCain and Sen. Dan Coats (R-Ind.) were speaking about the National Security Agency's (NSA) phone "metadata" collection program when Paul tried to ask a question. Coats said he had not yielded the floor to Paul, effectively blocking the 2016 presidential candidate from speaking. Coats then yielded to McCain for a question, instead. "The senator from Kentucky needs to learn the rules of the Senate," McCain said. "Maybe the...

The Department of Justice is concentrating on “far-right” groups in a new study of social media usage aimed at combatting violent extremism. The Justice Department’s National Institute of Justice (NIJ) awarded Michigan State University $585,719 for the study, which was praised by Eric Holder, the former attorney general, earlier this year. “There is currently limited knowledge of the role of technology and computer mediated communications (CMCs), such as Facebook and Twitter, in the dissemination of messages that promote extremist agendas and radicalize individuals to violence,” according to the NIJ grant. “The proposed study will address this gap through a series...

To say that the Daily Kos, Democratic Underground, and other progressive sites have carried the water for Obama since he emerged on the national stage is a drastic understatement. They've covered up lies, downplayed scandals, accused Republicans of everything from rape to murder, and through it all declared Barack Obama as one of their greatest heroes. It takes a lot to turn the opinions of blinded sheep like these. And while they have yet to awaken to who the President really is, the NSA scandal and the government's stance on Edward Snowden has started to make them hate the man...