US/National security
 US/National security  | |
|---|---|
| Type | legal, fraud |
In 2009, US Attorney General Eric Holder explicitly stated that lawyers would only invoke the privilege when there was a possibility of "significant harm" to the USA, and that they would not use it to hide to hide "administrative error", to "prevent embarrassment" or hide illegal government programs.[1] This is an ever more blatant lie. The US government cited national security to withhold information a record 8,496 times — a 57 percent increase over a year earlier and more than double Obama’s first year".[2] It has been used to arm terrorist groups[3] and avoid explaining why the FBI turned a blind eye (or worse) to the Dallas occupy plot to assassinate leaders of the peaceful protests.
Contents
Legal 'Get Out Of Jail Free'
"National security" is increasingly being codified into law as a kind of legal "Get Out Of Jail Free" card - i.e. a sovereign immunity, a way to avoid being prosecuted under the law to which only national governments have resort.
Arming terrorists
In the USA, the Arms Export Control Act "prohibit[s] sending weaponry to countries... [if] that country has repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism," however, the president is allowed "to waive those prohibitions if he “determines that the transaction is essential to the national security interests of the United States.”" This clause was used by Barack Obama in 2013 to send arms to Syrian rebels linked to Al Qaeda. [4]
Withholding information
Many nations have some official form of 'State Secrets Privilege', a legal doctrine allowing the government to withhold information during legal proceedings which they would otherwise have to disclose (such as, for example, the source of information, or answers to questions from the defence). This is intended to be used only for (scarce) matters of "National Security". It is (often explicitly) not to be used to cover wrongdoing, although ever more blatantly -- in USA particularly -- it is being used to do exactly that. In 2009, US Attorney General Eric Holder explicitly stated that lawyers would only invoke the privilege when there was a possibility of "significant harm" to the country, and that they would not use it to hide to hide "administrative error", to "prevent embarrassment" or hide illegal government programs.[5]
Rahinah Ibrahim case
In February 2014 Rahinah Ibrahim became the first person ever to successfully get themselves removed from a US government no fly list, after a decade of legal battles in which lawyers give millions of dollars of legal help. The ruling was made after a five-day, non-jury trial conducted largely behind closed doors. The US Justice Department was unavailable for comment.[6]
At long last, the government has conceded that plaintiff poses no threat to air safety or national security and should never have been placed on the no-fly list. She got there by human error within the FBI. This too is conceded. This was no minor human error but an error with palpable impact, leading to the humiliation, cuffing, and incarceration of an innocent and incapacitated air traveler. That it was human error may seem hard to accept — the FBI agent filled out the nomination form in a way exactly opposite from the instructions on the form, a bureaucratic analogy to a surgeon amputating the wrong digit — human error, yes, but of considerable consequence. Judge Alsup's ruling[7]
References
- ↑ http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/09/state-secrets/
- ↑ http://www.salon.com/2014/08/21/the_u_s_governments_creeping_war_on_journalists_partner/
- ↑ http://news.firedoglake.com/2013/09/17/obama-bypasses-terrorism-rule-to-give-weapons-to-syrian-rebels/
- ↑ http://news.firedoglake.com/2013/09/17/obama-bypasses-terrorism-rule-to-give-weapons-to-syrian-rebels/
- ↑ http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/09/state-secrets/
- ↑ http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2014/02/no-fly-coverup/
- ↑ http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2014/02/ibraruling.pdf
