United Liberty
House passes NDAA, White House backs off veto threats
Thu, 12/15/2011 - 9:09am | posted by Jason Pye
[UPDATE - 7:23pm] The United States Senate passed the NDAA this evening by a vote of 86 to 13. It will now head to President Obama’s desk for approval.
As noted yesterday, House and Senate conferees were moving the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) forward to the final action in both chambers with compromise legislation that kept in controversial language that would allow for the indefinite detention of American citizens and legal residents of the United States.
Unfortunately, the House of Representatives passed the NDAA overwhelmingly last night by a vote of 283 to 136. You can see how your representative and the members of your state’s delegation voted here. It now heads to the Senate for final passage.
For those of you that are just now catching up on this, the House basically voted last night to suspend the right to due process, the right to a trial by a jury of an accuser’s peers, and the right to habeas corpus. And now that the so-called “war on terror” has been expanded to include not only al-Qaeda but also the Taliban and other “associated forces.” Given the war on terrorism has become an open-ended war with civil liberties being offered by Congress on the alter of the “national security,” this provision will be no doubt be abused; if not by this administration than the next.
It was also noted that the White House asked for the language, at least according to Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI). So it should come as no surprise that the White House has backed off veto threats of the NDAA:
The White House on Wednesday abandoned its threat that President Barack Obama would veto a defense bill over provisions on how to handle suspected terrorists as Congress raced to finish the legislation.
Press secretary Jay Carney said last-minute changes that Obama and his national security team sought produced legislation that “does not challenge the president’s ability to collect intelligence, incapacitate dangerous terrorists and protect the American people.”
Based on the modifications, “the president’s senior advisers will not recommend a veto,” the White House said.
Adam Serwer notes that despite all the assurances and revisions that have supposedly put the White House at ease, the NDAA is still bad news for Americans:
[Yesterday] I wrote that by making the mandatory military detention provisions mandatory in name only, the Senate had offered the administration an opportunity to see how seriously it takes its own rhetoric on civil liberties. The administration had said that the military detention provisions of an earlier version of the NDAA were “inconsistent with the fundamental American principle that our military does not patrol our streets.”
The revised NDAA is still inconsistent with that fundamental American principle. But the administration has decided that fundamental American principles aren’t actually worth vetoing the bill over.
The Constitution and Bill of Rights have meant little to Congress and the Bush and Obama administrations. Sadly, what little in the way of protected civil liberties were essentially cast aside last night. Our Founding Fathers are no doubt spinning in their graves.
Good, with this law passed, we can finally take down those terrorist scumbags.
yeah, like those horrible peaceful protestors excercising their constitutional right to assemble, right?
idiot.
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And any other person American citizen or not that opposes the regime in place right now.
You are an idiot. Do you honestly think this will protect you? No. All this does is limit your freedom that much more because of government control.
Wake up!!! With this law passed the government is taking your rights away!!! You will have no say in defending yourself. If you try to defend yourself you are then being a threat to national security and would be considered a terrorist and may very well be tortured and executed. This “law” would be the end of life as we know it. Have a good day, btw you should make plans for a survival strategy cuz when the military starts loading everybody up on buses to take them to those FEMA death camps all over the country you might be one of the dumb ones to actually get on the bus. :)
It is time for everyone to pull their head out of the sand and realize the government wants to enslave us even more than they all ready have. Don’t be fooled, GET informed. Our children are the future and we must be prepared to protect them. The bus is coming, they will tell you it is for your own protection but look around. We traded our freedom for security a long time ago. Time for the frogs to jump out of the boiling water and save themselves. There is a live web cast event tonight that is interactive and will cover the future global economy and what we NEED to do NOW to be prepared. This web cast was set weeks ago & the timing is imperative. Register now - http://bit.ly/sMKGiJ
Obvious troll is obvious.
woow seriously have you even read what this will do you have to be the retarded person out there to think this is a good thing when this takes effect its time to go to some other country where we dont have to deal with bullshit like this
Successful troll is successful.
Are you fucking kidding me?
I hope they arrest your stupid ass just so you can see what a not so free country we’re in.
Irony.
Exactly! Just like the Obama administration took out Osama Bin Laden. Oh, that’s right! We didn’t have that legislation when that happened. Hmm, well, I’ll get it right one of these times.
I hope you are disappeared and die in a FEMA camp, dumbass
We have already taken out their main leaders, hence there being no reason to even pass this. All this is doing is destroying our rights even more by allowing the military to detain anyone they want to.
Yea and send you to a fema camp to die =)
It is true that FEMA has shown many times limits. Every time people need them, they fail to do their job.
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Youre kidding right?
Terrible just terrible. Another form of “control” by the American government. And the icing on the cake *drum roll* $690 million dollar budget. Again a Government who has no clue how to run a country….bring on more debt…don’t care about regular citizens…all they care about is power, greed and self interest. There needs to be a fundamental change…………..
It’s actually $690 Billion dollars. Even worse.
Yeah I was gunna say, if they could run the country on that amount of money I would be OK.
@King Reggin you f**king retard, how f**king stupidly retarded you are.
I don’t live in the US and I’m not American. But if so, I’ll do what ever it takes to help them win the fight against oppression you f^^k nut.
I bet you can count your IQ on your hand can’t you, ass wipe.
Your a government cock sucking prick, this bill doesn’t protect Americans, it’s going to f**king destroy them…
I do hate ignorant d*ck heads.
Elegantly put
Damn straight. I agree. If you want to have so much blind faith in a goverment that doesn’t give two squirts of piss about you then that’s your choice, but when the sh*t hits the fan don’t be suprised when your covered in crap and there’s nowhere left to go. The goverment is supposed to uphold the will of the people not the other way around. If you think the goverment or thier fat cat friends care about your opinion just recall the presidential race outcome between bush and gore. (Gore won but we still got screwed by bush). Unfortunately Gore just rolled over and took it. Of course I’m sure the skull and bones put so much work at getting him in.(wouldn’t want to make thier hard work for nothing now would we) Just because they have money doesn’t make them better than us. If all the middle and lower class just decided not to go to thier jobs because they didn’t like what the goverment was doing, the U.S. would grind to a halt. Just remember they my be the “powerful and elite”, but let’s see them have to go behind the counter at starbucks and have to make there own latte’. Or maybe try to go to one of their fancy resteraunts only to find out they have to make it themselfs. Long story short, they need us more than we need them. Their are more of us than, and most importantly, THEY WORK FOR US WE DON’T WORK FOR THEM!!!
And just think, with the SOPA coming up, the only comment that would be on this page right now would be the first one talking about ” terrorist scumbags”. Who knows, maybe in another 10 years, the rest of us will end up in jail for having a conversation about this.
I’m so excited
Well said…my only hope is that this can be reversed. Remember, a similar law was passed during the 1950’s and the Red Scare and didn’t last forever. If it is to be undone though, we’re going to do a lot more than sit on our couches. I hope everyone here who is just as outraged as I plans to make their opinions known in some fashion.
We need to do it now before this law truly becomes the status quo.
Another similar law was passed before that as well. Two Acts were passed called the Alien and Sedition Acts. They were largely abused by the party in power to suppress the other party. Anyone who trusts the government not to abuse this power they’ve given themselves hasn’t taken a look at our history.
We’re all doomed. We all thought the government had enough control before this, but now… It blows my mind how our country continues to fall further and further down the slippery slope to failure.
I swear, this Admin uses the Constitution as toilet paper.
Not true. If they used it as toilet paper, then they would have to admit that the Constitution was at least useful. I seriously doubt this administration considers the Constitution useful in any way, and therefore don’t use it as toilet paper.
I suspect they’re happier just pretending that pesky little thing doesn’t exist.
No but this administration threatened to veto if it didn’t say exactly what they wanted it too didn’t it!
This administration didn’t write the bill. Or ANY bill. Congress and House does that.
Yes, but if he was doing what he promised he would VETOED IT.
Still confused…the Patriot Act does virtually the same thing which has been in place for some time now…maybe this is just a reminder to those who have lost track that we are COMPLETELY screwed now? What language does this hold that the Patriot Act does not…do they work together? If only I were a leglislative scholar so I could know my rights as an American citizen, it is all so confusing.
Basically, it’s just another nail in the coffin of Lady Liberty.
The provisions in regards to detention are more specific to U.S. citizens, whereas in the PATRIOT act the controversy was more about information gathering techniques on U.S. citizens among others…
This is just lovely. The only good that will come from this is maybe, just maybe, ignorant pricks like ‘King Reggin’ will see what happens, and eyes will be opened to how terrible our government really is.
i’m glad i’m not american and i donit live in america. cause this is so freaking scary.
Hello FEMA Camps, - Why didn’t Ron Paul vote??? Who was the one specifically arguing against this bill since the wording was changed. Now we go to the senate who more concerned with filling the own pockets then protecting the True Blue Americans. WAKE-UP America!! Instead of arguing with 99-1 issues, we need to be fighting for our Constitutional rights.
i’m gonna sing the doom song, doom da doom doom doomie doom doom doomie doom da doom doom doomie doom doom. yea we have all seen better days and there are now officially over.
Just curious. When is it acceptable to rebel against tyranny?
right now I think
Find your local representative and contact him/her and then organize and vote to throw them out on their ears!
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