Democratic Party Hero of the Day

[RobertEarl]

This award goes to Rep. Conyers.

He supported the right of the people to be free from secret government spying today in congress. And he almost got the amendment passed that would limit spying only on those people who have probable cause to be spied on, and not you.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=3332727

Thanks you Rep. Conyers. If only we had 400 more like you in congress!

[PowerToThePeople]

1. One of the small handfull of true progressives we have. n/t

[RobertEarl]

3. He is a winner

He has stood for us so many times. He even tried to make sure the voting machines were not hacked.

Can you imagine that he found a republican that would stand with him to try and limit the spying? Too bad not enough democrats stood with him. Pelosi and Hoyer, our two top house members voted against Conyers.

Wonder what Obama had to say about the vote. Guess Obama opposed it?

[carolinayellowdog]

2. if they dare call Conyers a racist for opposing the administration

we have really gone down the rabbit hole into bizarro world

[Aerows]

6. Wait for it

It will likely happen. The man is a Democratic Party member through and through, but Third Ways do not like him.

[awoke_in_2003]

7. A lot here slam Cornell West...

whenever he disagrees with the president.

[RobertEarl]

4. Are all of us to be suspects?

The vote today was about just this: Are all Americans now suspects? Or must there be probable cause before we become suspected? The constitution says there must be probable cause for the government to spy on you. Obama doesn't think the constitution matters as much as the nsa.

[Aerows]

5. Rep. Conyers

and his wife have been railroaded so many times, you can't doubt that they are up to something good. Both have been annihilated by the press more times than I can count. Everything he has been found guilty of, and his wife has been found guilty of, is something that everyone else under the sun would have been acquitted upon, but he rocks the boat.

[questionseverything]

8. another dem hero/wyden

'Secret Laws'

According to Wyden, the post-9/11 PATRIOT Act and FISA Amendments Act have done more than facilitate a level of domestic surveillance. If allowed to expand, unchecked, he argued, they could turn "the idea of a telescreen monitoring your every move...from dystopia to reality."

The Senator says that the Acts created, for the first time in our nation's history, a secret system of laws. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Courts, operating in secret and relying only upon the one-sided, non-adversarial secret presentations by government lawyers, issue decisions that only the government is permitted to see.

Wyden stated:

The reliance of government on a secret body of law has real consequences. Most Americans don't expect to know the details about ongoing, sensitive military and intelligence activities, but, as voters, they absolutely have a right and a need to know what their government believes it is permitted to do. Because, that is what Americans need to be able to ratify or reject decisions that elected officials make on their behalf.

It is a fundamental principle of American democracy that laws should not be public only when it is convenient for government officials to make them public…If Americans aren't able to learn how their government interprets and executes the law, then we will have eliminated the fundamental bulwark of our democracy.

Without public laws, and public court rulings interpreting those laws, it is impossible to have informed public debate. And when the American people are in the dark, they can't make fully informed decisions about who should represent them, or protest policies that they disagreed with.

[Hydra]

9. In a lot of ways, this is a very dark hour for our party

But also highlights those who are still fighting for us. Conyers did that, and had to do it fighting a President from our party.

Interesting times.

[RobertEarl]

10. Yes. Conyers is fighting for us

A lonely occupation. He is a brave man.

[Quantess]

11. That was good of him. (no text)