i couldn't believe it when i read the enclosed <link>

the justice department has supboena'ed the ENTIRE list of visitors to an indpendent news site

not only this, they put a "gag order" on the subpoeana, so that other news organizations would not find out, or object to, or report on this invasion of privacy

if bush did something like this - subpoena'ed the list of IP addresses of people who posted in slate's fray, for example, this place would be on fire - people calling for bush's impeachment.

but evidently its perfectly okay when obama does it? and tries to cover his tracks?

day by day our freedom of speech is being eroded - obama tries to ostracize and limit news sites which ask questions he's uncomfortable with, and now the use of secret subpoeanas to intimidate other news organizations.

why isn't the american civil liberties union filing a lawsuit to protest this?

oh . . .my bad . . . that's right - this was a SECRET subpoena, so nobody would find out.

well - that certainly makes it okay.

Hi BA,

Indymedia is an aggregation site and it tends to blur the lines between journalism, and activism—as such there is some question about whether or not a journalist’s shield would apply.

Further, it’s a left of center site suggesting that the DOJ’s request was related to something other than the aggregated journalist’s content. Finally—it’s not the first time Indymedia has draw attention. In 2004 the Justice Department sent a subpoena asking for information on who posted information on Republican delegates to the NY convention (the activism part of the site, targeting them for harassment).

Although I tend to agree with you that 1st amendment rights should prevail in such circumstances it’s somewhat telling that the prior administration’s DOJ did the same thing and there wasn’t much of an outcry then either (reflective more of the site’s unclear mission).

There’s no evidence to support this originated at the White House (in either instance--so your headline tying it to Obama seems a little disengenuous and I doubt Bush was directly responsible for the 2004 event) and it looks to be more incompetent lawyers in the DOJ acting on their concerns rather than a nefarious plot. Oh—the subpoena was withdrawn.

I’d be more interested in the reasons behind the subpoena—Indymedia has also in the past received a subpoena for server logs related to an attempted murder investigation in Italy, which seems to be a legitimate investigatory path.

The problem with granting excessive authority to the executive branch and the DOJ through measures like the Patriot Act is that they don’t remain solely in the hands of the folks you grant them to. Nonetheless, while I agree with you that on principle this is a bad idea I’d like to know the specifics of the reasons behind the subpoena before completely condemning it—if there’s a legitimate investigation (e.g., if there was some tie in to the Fort Hood case) I’d be less inclined to attribute malicious intent for such an action.

desmo - i LOVED the way you justified the supoena of indy news - essentially dissing them not complying with your standards of news reporting. you and obama - great minds think alike

presumably, by your standard - you'd have ZERO PROBLEMS with the federal government issuing subpoeanas for the IDs of everyone posting in fray - because this site is about "activism" rather than reporting.

what? you're not okay with that?

you mean you're only okay with subpoenas on people who's politics don't align with you personally?

there's a word for that - guess what it is?

bush did do something exactly like this .heres one ,he orderd all public libraries to turn over all lists of people who checked out , as his administration called them<"subversive books", like the book "reason" and the works of madison on the needed vigilence against goverment intrusion .So bush did these things and i bet along with most of you con idiots you agreed and defended it .silly con,thinking not for you!

baltimore aureole:

desmo - i LOVED the way you justified the supoena of indy news - essentially dissing them not complying with your standards of news reporting. you and obama - great minds think alike

presumably, by your standard - you'd have ZERO PROBLEMS with the federal government issuing subpoeanas for the IDs of everyone posting in fray - because this site is about "activism" rather than reporting.

what? you're not okay with that?

you mean you're only okay with subpoenas on people who's politics don't align with you personally?

there's a word for that - guess what it is?

Read above post while looking in the mirror!

I take you for someone serious and expect you to address the content:

1. I did not justify the subpoena and explicitly stated that 1st amendment concerns ought to prevail

1. I also stated that the site referenced is known not for being a journalism site—it aggregates already published pieces and has a strong advocacy and activism component, which makes the question of journalistic shield protection a little less clear. Source protection for journalists applies to journalists (and has its limits) but it doesn’t apply to activists seeking to target Republican delegates at a convention in NYC nor does it permit a site to impede an attempted murder investigation.

1. I pointed out that the first amendment is not absolute—that legitimate investigatory paths may well be consistent with not only the nature of the site but with any sites 1st amendment protections—the 1st amendment is not absolute—you don’t get to break the law or yell fire in a crowded theater (hence my curiosity about the reasons behind the subpoena).

1. I pointed out that the previous DOJ had done the same thing on two occasions and there was no outcry and no reason to believe that Bush or Obama were the actors in question but incompetent lawyers at Justice.

As for subpoenas for IP addresses here—that’s been done when legally warranted and (read the terms of service) you’re still responsible for what you post here. I believe in the law, the 1st amendment and in their proper limits.

I also made no distinction between Republican and Democratic administrations doing the same thing. What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander and your charge that I think it OK for one and not for another is baseless. There is no political bias in what I posted. If someone here posts something that can incur civil or criminal liability they can (and will) be subpoenaed.

And I find it more than a little strange that you accuse me of being “okay with subpoenas on people who's politics don't align with you personally” when Indy media is a LEFT of center site and my politics (at least it seems to you) would align with that, though I would disagree. I’m libertarian with right of center fiscal leanings and left of center social on social issues.

Where you got that response is anyone’s guess but it certainly wasn’t derived from the content. I know you’re smarter than that.

I’m not defending the subpoena and explicitly stated that but I am interested in the basis for it. If there were a legitimate investigatory path consistent with the limits on 1st amendment protection I’d like to know that.

But in either event, accusing Obama, me, Bush, the prior or this DOJ or anyone else of approving blanket subpoenas of IP addresses for any site is simply factually untrue.

So if Obama's polar opposite (say a grand wizard of the KKK) by some equally unfortunate turn of events, became president and issued subpoena's for the visitor records to Daily Kos or the Puffington Host, you'd have no problem with that?

Jack

as I said to BA in my follow up response:

1. I did not justify the subpoena and explicitly stated that 1st amendment concerns ought to prevail

1. I also stated that the site referenced is known not for being a journalism site—it aggregates already published pieces and has a strong advocacy and activism component, which makes the question of journalistic shield protection a little less clear. Source protection for journalists applies to journalists (and has its limits) but it doesn’t apply to activists seeking to target Republican delegates at a convention in NYC nor does it permit a site to impede an attempted murder investigation.

1. I pointed out that the first amendment is not absolute—that legitimate investigatory paths may well be consistent with not only the nature of the site but with any sites 1st amendment protections—the 1st amendment is not absolute—you don’t get to break the law or yell fire in a crowded theater (hence my curiosity about the reasons behind the subpoena).

1. I pointed out that the previous DOJ had done the same thing on two occasions and there was no outcry and no reason to believe that Bush or Obama were the actors in question but incompetent lawyers at Justice.

As for subpoenas for IP addresses here—that’s been done when legally warranted and (read the terms of service) you’re still responsible for what you post here. I believe in the law, the 1st amendment and in their proper limits.

I also made no distinction between Republican and Democratic administrations doing the same thing. What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander and your charge that I think it OK for one and not for another is baseless. There is no political bias in what I posted. If someone here posts something that can incur civil or criminal liability they can (and will) be subpoenaed.

And I find it more than a little strange that she accuses me of being “okay with subpoenas on people who's politics don't align with you personally” when Indy media is a LEFT of center site and my politics (at least it seems to you) would align with that, though I would disagree. I’m libertarian with right of center fiscal leanings and left of center social on social issues.

Where you got that response is anyone’s guess but it certainly wasn’t derived from the content. I know you’re smarter than that.

I’m not defending the subpoena and explicitly stated that but I am interested in the basis for it. If there were a legitimate investigatory path consistent with the limits on 1st amendment protection I’d like to know that.

But in either event, accusing Obama, me, Bush, the prior or this DOJ or anyone else of approving blanket subpoenas of IP addresses for any site is simply factually untrue.

Short answer--if some KKK leader got elected (oh.... wait that already happened before... Duke, Byrd, edward Jackson.... never mind) and then wanted to subponea IP records without cause of course I would not support that and don't support the one against Indymedia--unless there are legitimate civil or criminal issues that obtain. But this is something done by both DOJs and as I have repeatedly stated I don't suport it unless there are legitimate investigatory paths that are legal and valid in the context of the 1st ammendment (again, it's not absolute).

That does lead me to curiosity about the genesis of the request. If there was something on there related to (say, for example) the Fort Hood shooting (just as an example--there are any number of issues--the targeting and harassment/interference with Republican delegated to the NYC convention would be another) wouldn't you want to know that and have it explored? It would be legtimate and I would.

Yeah, but you succumbed to your natural bent and immediately started questioning the vilidity of the site, rather than the lack of wisdom of the WH for issuing the subpoena. If there is legitimate suspicion of criminal activity then the proper departments should handle the investigations and subpoena's.

This White House seems way to inclined to try and find out what everyone is saying about them. If Obama would stop playing Chicago Politics and just do his job, some of the criticism might diminish a bit.

Mine wouldn't but some might. Simply put, Obama needs to knock of this Hitler/Chavez/Castro/Nixonian bullshit.

Jack

Good Lord.

Do you have a citation showing that he ordered public libraries to turn over lists of all people who checked out "subversive books"? A rhetorical question. You don't, because he didn't.

Not true…

I researched the links and then the stories on the site tied into news sources—which is how I discovered the 2004 DOJ subpoenas for targeting Republican delegates and the attempted murder investigation in Italy (all during the previous administration). If any WH would target that left leaning site it seems more likely that a right of center WH would then a left of center would.

And it seems to be the DOJ lawyers acting stupidly—I don’t believe Obama issued that anymore than I believe Bush did in 2004 (and there’s certainly no evidence to that effect that either did).

i wont hold my breath waiting

i have something for you.

your idiotic lie debunked again:

CBS Does Its Part In Fueling The “Blame Obama” Mentality By Jamie Tuesday Nov 10, 2009 3:00pm

The Justice Department has subpoenaed indymedia.us for its visitor logs for a certain date. While this raises big flags regarding online privacy, something else happened with this action that is very odd. The recipient of the subpoena was told she could not talk about it unless authorized by the Justice Department – an essential gag order.

Of course news like this would send the right into a full frenzy that Obama is trying to silence the media, even a left-leaning site like indymedia. Here’s Hot Air’s take on it:

Did the White House try to open up a two-front war on the media? Before the Obama administration launched an all-out battle with conservative-leaning Fox News Channel, the Department of Justice demanded the records of all visitor information of left-leaning Indymedia.us in an remarkable subpoena of a media outlet, for one specific day. No one can recall any precedent for such a wide-ranging probe into the records of a media website, but it may provide a challenge to a national-security law if the DoJ presses hard enough:

But there’s a problem with this “blame Obama” mentality. The original source of the article is the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and this is what they say about the subpoena:

On January 30th, 2009, Kristina Clair of Philadelphia, PA — one of the system administrators of the server that hosts the indymedia.us site — received in the mail a grand jury subpoena from the Southern District of Indiana federal court. The FBI had sent an email to Ms. Clair a couple of weeks earlier asking where a subpoena directed at the indymedia.us site should be sent. So, we at EFF were ready and waiting to evaluate the subpoena as soon as it arrived. Yet even we were surprised at what we saw. A PDF of the entire subpoena is available here.

And let’s look at when the actual subpoena was signed:

See that? It was signed on January 23rd of 2009 – three days after Obama was sworn in.

Even CBS has jumped on board with this “blame Obama mentality”:

Under long-standing Justice Department guidelines, subpoenas to members of the news media are supposed to receive special treatment. One portion of the guidelines, for instance, says that "no subpoena may be issued to any member of the news media" without "the express authorization of the attorney general" – that would be current attorney general Eric Holder – and subpoenas should be "directed at material information regarding a limited subject matter."

Eric Holder wasn’t confirmed until February 2, 2009. So how could Holder have authorized a subpoena that was entered into the court record 13 days before even being sworn in?

These attempts to pin everything on Obama are always present in the rightwing blogosphere, but the fact that CBS, a major U.S. media outlet, actually started the latest episode is appalling. You would expect the author of the article would have read the actual subpoena, which they linked,

On the other hand this proves that the Obama Administration isn’t the only administration to declare war on media outlets. We now have even more proof of the Bush administration doing just that, and we have CBS and a rightwing blog helping to confirm it by their own error. I’m sure this case is still moving forward and I don’t know all the facts of it. A new President doesn’t come into office and immediately halt every single prosecution going on in the DOJ. If that happened our country would really be in a mess. So this case is actually a left over from the Bush years.

U.S. Attorney On April 28, 2008, Timothy M. Morrison was appointed as United States Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana by U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey. This followed Mr. Morrison's service as Acting United States Attorney beginning October 1, 2007, upon the resignation of United States Attorney Susan W. Brooks. Morrison has been with the Department of Justice for more than 19 years and has served as First Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of Indiana for most of that time. On two previous occasions, he served as interim U.S. Attorney, once in October, 1993 and for twenty months from February, 2000 to October, 2001. As United States Attorney, Morrison supervises a staff of 30 lawyers, who serve as Assistant United States Attorneys and a support staff of about 40 persons. The United States Attorney is the legal representative of the United States Government for both civil lawsuits and criminal prosecutions and serves as an official spokesperson for the Department of Justice with relation to activities occurring in the Southern District of Indiana. Morrison served as Chief Deputy Prosecuting Attorney for Monroe County, Indiana between 1975 and 1981. He worked as a supervising deputy prosecutor in Marion County, Indiana, in the 1980's, where he prosecuted sex crimes and homicides, including two death penalty cases. Originally from Fort Wayne, Indiana, Morrison obtained an undergraduate degree in political science from Indiana University in 1971 and a law degree from Indiana University-Bloomington in 1974. He is admitted to practice in Indiana state courts, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana and the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. He is a member of the Indiana State and Seventh Circuit Bar Associations, the National Association of former United States Attorneys and the Sagamore Inn of Court in Indianapolis.

too bad it will be lost on the alternate reality living Murdoch's propaganda victim, weak brained incapable for an analysis BA