Democrats and civil rights advocates condemned the Justice Department today for barring a gay pride event planned by department employees, and called on Attorney General John Ashcroft to reverse the decision. […]
A group of several hundred gay and lesbian Justice Department employees, called DOJ Pride, had budgeted $600 to hold an awards ceremony on June 18 at the department’s Great Hall to celebrate Gay Pride Month. The group has held similar events at the department each of the last six years, members said, and Mr. Ashcroft’s top deputy spoke at last year’s event.
But Justice Department officials have told the group that it cannot hold the ceremony at the department this year because of a new policy prohibiting events not recognized by White House proclamation.
Mr. Bush has issued hundreds of presidential proclamations, recognizing events like National African American History Month, National Prayer Day and Leif Erikson Day.
But unlike President Bill Clinton, Mr. Bush has not recognized Gay Pride Month.
Still think you’ll be able to sleep? Check out This American Life from last week:
Act One. Until the End of the War. There are at least two American citizens being held without charges, unable to see lawyers, in military jails in the U.S. There may be more. Jack Hitt tried to find out everything he could about one of them: Jose Padilla, who will stay confined to a brig in South Carolina “until the end of the war” according to the White House.
Act Two. Secret Trials and Secret Deportations. In the war on terror, the government is rounding up foreigners, checking their immigration status, and then, sometimes, deporting them. It won’t give out their names. David Kestenbaum tried to find out everything that can be found out about who these new deportees are … and about what happened to them once they were seized and put on trial, in secret. To do this, he has to bypass the federal government (which won’t say much about the deportees) and head overseas, to talk with them firsthand.
Act Three. Secret Wiretaps from a Secret Court. For over two decades, there’s been a secret court in the United States called the FISA court (short for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act). Its job is to authorize wiretaps on possible foreign spies and foreign agents. In 24 years, it has never turned down a government request for a wiretap, as best as any outsider can tell—until this year. This past summer the court said issued an opinion that said Attorney General John Ashcroft and the Justice Department were going way too far in their zeal for wiretaps. It cited 75 cases in which the Justice Department tried to sneak around rules to protect Americans from surveillance. Blue Chevigny reports on attempts to loosen up the rules on who the government spies on here in the U.S., and on this first-ever glimpse inside this secret court.
Great political U-turns #94
I was writing the other day about how politicians who are in opposition will speak out against something they agree with because they feel they have to, because it’s their job as the opposition; once they get into power, they’ll make a 180 degree turn and do the exact thing they denounced. Therefore the only way to predict a politician’s actual behavior is to examine his past voting record when in power, and completely ignore anything said when campaigning. Case in point:
There is a concern that the Internet could be used to commit crimes and that advanced encryption could disguise such activity. However, we do not provide the government with phone jacks outside our homes for unlimited wiretaps. Why, then, should we grant government the Orwellian capability to listen at will and in real time to our communications across the Web?
The protections of the Fourth Amendment are clear. The right to protection from unlawful searches is an indivisible American value. Two hundred years of court decisions have stood in defense of this fundamental right. The state’s interest in effective crime-fighting should never vitiate the citizens’ Bill of Rights. […]
The administration’s interest in all e-mail is a wholly unhealthy precedent, especially given this administration’s track record on FBI files and IRS snooping. Every medium by which people communicate can be subject to exploitation by those with illegal intentions. Nevertheless, this is no reason to hand Big Brother the keys to unlock our e-mail diaries, open our ATM records, read our medical records, or translate our international communications.
—John Ashcroft, October 1997.
Reassurance
“When you carefully consider FOIA requests and decide to withhold records, in whole or in part, you can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your decisions unless they lack a sound legal basis or present an unwarranted risk of adverse impact on the ability of other agencies to protect other important records.”
—Attorney General John Ashcroft
Ray Ozzie, one of the founders of Lotus, has been sighted standing obediently behind Bill Gates at the Windows XP media events. Obviously the fact that Microsoft paid Groove (Ray’s new startup) $51m is the reason.
Equally obvious is the fact that Groove will suffer the same fate as most of the other companies that have decided to let Microsoft invest in them. Expect to see Groove technology bundled into Windows and .NET, and a worthless husk spat out. If you don’t believe me, ask the people at LH or VIVO (say). The same would have happened to Real if they hadn’t been secretly working on RealPlayer G2 and keeping it out of the scope of their agreement with Microsoft.
It’s all business as usual for Microsoft; but somehow, it’s bothering me. It’s not enough for Gates to win; he has to humiliate his enemies. He couldn’t beat Lotus, so he needs Ray Ozzie up there on stage, dancing obediently like a little marionette.
Deconstructing the show, the message is clear: “We are unspeakably rich. We own you. We can buy your loyalty any time and make you dance for us. Submit now.”
The message to users of Windows XP is much the same. The new software license enforcement mechanism will attempt to force home users to buy a separate copy for every computer they use, and make them sign up with Microsoft Passport and hand over their personal data.
In not-unrelated news, the new judge assigned to the anti-trust trial by George W Bush turns out to have sold all her stock in Microsoft’s competitors right in the middle of a tech slump. Perhaps for some reason she doesn’t think they’ll go up? Attorney General John Ashcroft personally collected $10,000 from Microsoft, and over $1m to the Republican Party.
Dance, puppets, dance.