Fort Dix Hero: Am I A Racist?

If anyone thinks there is any validity to claims that Muslims need special protections against so-called whistle blowers based upon the Fort Dix incident and revelations around a video tape that brought the group to the attention of the FBI - read this Post exclusive. It wasn't the first time the group of ten bearded men had been seen lingering outside the store. What's frightening is his hesitation and that someone in the teen's position might need protection by legislation against being sued.

Eventually, the group - who'd been seen standing outside earlier that January 2006 week - selected two men to go inside while the rest waited in the parking lot, an employee who was outside smoking at the time recalled.

Once inside, the two men approached the television section of the electronics store where videos could be transferred to DVD and copies could be made.

They handed the teenage clerk a mini-cassette tape from a camcorder and asked for a $20 transfer to be made to DVD. As they waited, the two men calmly walked around the store looking at televisions, video games and DVDs.

What they didn't know was that they had sealed their ultimate fate.

When the teen and another employee went into a back room and began the conversion of the tape, they saw a group of bearded men wearing "fundamentalist attire" and shooting "big, f-ing guns," the teen later told co-workers.

Throughout the 90-minute-long tape, above the booming gunfire at a Pennsylvania target range, the jihadists could be heard screaming "God is great!"

The two employees "freaked out," their co-worker recalled.

At first, the teenage clerk didn't know what to do, his pal said.

"Dude, I just saw some really weird s-," he frantically told his co-worker. "I don't know what to do. Should I call someone or is that being racist?"

The fellow employee tried to calm his friend and told him that if what he saw terrified him so much, he should tell the police.

The teen first consulted with a manager before making the 911 call.

FBI agents got a copy of the tape from Circuit City, and went to the teen's house and interviewed him at length.

Comments

[Lala]

http://www.nysun.com/article/54389

Mark Steyn has a great column in the New York Sun.

[Tom]

Tom the simple fact that we can all get on a site like this is proof that your the one that is scared. If this country was the dictatorship that you claim it is or will become then why aren't all the libs who post or blog in evil Republican jails? Why aren't major Democratic party leaders in jail on allsorts of made up charges? Why is it that they even won back control of the two houses of Congress if the evil Conservatives and the Patriot Act were going to be used to quash our rights.
This country has along 200 plus year history of the rule of law and it will follow those rules. I say once again I really don't have a problem with the Government spelling out who they are going to go after with secret wire taps and such.

Posted by: southdakotaboy

The more I read spew such as yours, I get more disgusted at the folks who think it is their job to allow the Govt to spy on us. If we have nothing to hide? is that the legitimate question concerning throwing away the 4th amendment? How about I have NOTHING to hide, so back off! How about not letting our scared little selves be led into a banana republic. Your reasons stating why we are not in a bad way are juvenile and stupid. Your reasoning has no merit and no amount of 'trusting the govt' will make your elementary arguments vaild. You are scared of little brown men. Nothing more and nothing less. You are scared and progessives think we can defeat this enemy without starting WWIII. The leaders you embrace are the wrong people, doing the wrong thing, for all of the wrong reasons. Why would you follow along?

[nowingker]

The Bush Administration has PLAINLY asserted the right to eavesdrop on American citizens suspected of having contact with alleged terrorists. Period. End of discussion.

That means that it is 100% accurate to say that Americans who are NOT suspected of being terrorists or helping terrorists, according to Bush, can be spied on without a warrant.
It also means 100% that the Bush Administration's assertion--eavesdropping on Americans without a warrant--means they have to provide NO SHOWING of probable cause whatsoever, even that there is reason to believe the alleged terrorist is a terrorist. That means all the govermnet has to do is say to itself, "We think John Smith is a terrorist, and they can then spy on anyone and everyone that has contact with John Smith, on that basis alone"

Either you don't understand what the government is asserting, or like most wingers, you ignore the factual matters and stick with the propaganda talking points.

Of course you would think the idea of the government spying on Americans without probable cause or a warrant or any show of cause is "nonsense"....just like free speech is nonsense, freedom from unreasonable search and seizure is more nonsense, frankly, the whole bill of rights is pure nonsense with the exception of the right to bear arms.

Thanks for playing.

[charles]

no you're the one who doesn't understand fisa or the nsa

to put it simply

99.9 percent is data mining, just like the stupid "frontline" article states

military intelligence is not legally actionable in the private sector, it. just.is.not.allowed. period

and you have proven time and again you know nothing of what i think, all you do is assume things because i post here

i post here because the leftists that participate in the comments here are chumps deserving of the smackdown, and dan is agressive, i can get behind that

either make yourself better informed or shut the fuck up, i am not a joiner, i am not a republican,
i am a stone cold cynic and you are a partisan party boy with a wicked case of bds

so don't tell me what i think, it's stupid to do so and i'm tired of it

[nowingker]

I understand FISA very well, the problem is that the NSA wiretapping BYPASSED FISA as I'm sure you know. They argued it was too cumbersome and might cause national security leaks so they argued the President himself had the authoritiy to authorize warrentless wiretaps on American citizens, even though that appears to quite clearly be ILLEGAL and unconstitutional.

What I find is that supporters of the Bush Administration routinely use false and misleading information when it has to to with national security issues.

The warrantless wiretapping of American citizens is illegal, just becuase the president authorized it doesn't magically make it legal since the president, contrary to what George W. Bush and Alberto 'I can't remember' Gonzales believe does not have powers outside the constitution and cannot legally order things that the constitution forbs.]

[Lala]

What's this?

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20060329-120346-1901r.htm

By Brian DeBose
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
March 29, 2006
President Bush broke no laws with the creation of the controversial surveillance program.
A panel of former Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judges yesterday told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee that President Bush did not act illegally when he created by executive order a wiretapping program conducted by the National Security Agency (NSA).
"If a court refuses a FISA application and there is not sufficient time for the president to go to the court of review, the president can under executive order act unilaterally, which he is doing now," said Judge Allan Kornblum, magistrate judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida and an author of the 1978 FISA Act. "I think that the president would be remiss exercising his constitutional authority by giving all of that power over to a statute."

August 10, 2006

[charles]

I understand FISA very well, the problem is that the NSA wiretapping BYPASSED FISA as I'm sure you know. They argued it was too cumbersome and might cause national security leaks so they argued the President himself had the authoritiy to authorize warrentless wiretaps on American citizens, even though that appears to quite clearly be ILLEGAL and unconstitutional.

stop the bullshit - just using the words "warrantless wiretaps" proves your ignorance

[nowingker]

What term do you prefer? Spying on Americans without a warrant? Reading emails and phone records without a warrant? Domestic surveillance without a warrant?

Please educate me on the proper nomenclature for the government arguing that it has the power to monitor any communication of an American citizen without getting a warrant.

Thanks in advance.

[charles]

it's not my responsibility or desire to educate you, and wouldn't waste my time

so don't thank me in advance, it's lame snark and i'm not impressed

and i'm well past really caring what you think

"What term do you prefer? Spying on Americans without a warrant? Reading emails and phone records without a warrant? Domestic surveillance without a warrant?"

data mining, which is what it is, i've stated it already, you've obviously chosen to cleave to the weasel words - quit attempting to waste my time

[southdakotaboy]

I now offically classify people on the left as nuts who are more afraid of the people trying to protect them then the people who state outright that they want to kill them. Liberalism has turned into a mental disease that needs to be put on a list of commitable mental disorders.
You guys are out of your ever loving minds Zifnab and Tom and nonwinger totally nuts.
And as far as being afraid of brown people, islam is not a race it is an ideology that has members of all races. I am not afraid of them or my government trying to stop them. Contrary to popular belief on the left there have not been massive roundups of people who disagree with the Government. Nor have has there been a suspension of our constitution. The simple fact that we can sit here and talk about this and each some links "proving" our side means that our government is acting in an open and accountable fashion. When we can sit here and talk about these things like we have kind of puts the whole lefty argument out the window.

[nowingker]

"Data mining" is the same as asserting a right to intercept email and listen to phone conversations when it is believed that one of the parties to the communications has terrorist ties.

Your posts have never appeared to be stupid, so, the only conclusion is that you are lying.

The government is doing BOTH, they are asserting a right of access to billions of data points on the idea that they can somehow sift through it and find the terrorists AND they are asserting an unqualified right to review emails and telephone conversations when one side is suspected by the gov. of having terrorist ties.

Impressing right wing liars isn't high on my list, I thought you were a somewhat credible conservative but I see you are just like the rest of them, so confident that government power will NEVER be turned against you that you don't care what is done as long as somebody tells you its keeping you safe from the evil muslim terrorists. Pathetic.

Don't bother responding.

[nowinkger]

That's another strawman argument Bob.

America's tradition of freedom cant' be curtailed overnight.

All you have to do is make people afraid of expressing themselves and you've won half the battle. A few high profile journalists are jailed and ALL the journalists will stop writing stories the gov. doens't like.

It is insideous, you've already fallen prey it it, the corrolary to "I have nothing to hide so I don't care of the government listens to my phone calls" is "He/she MUST have something to hide or they wouldn't mind" following on that is the idea, spoken daily on here that if the government SAYS you are guilty then you ARE guilty, no need for a messy, costly trial, lawyers and evidence. George Bush says you are a terrorist so that's that.

All you have to do is raid a few muslim charities, put some people on trial and muslims will stop giving to these charities for fear of being arrrested and called a terrorist.

It's called INTIMIDATION and has a long history of being very, very successful.

We're in the early stages of losing our freedom here, things will die down until the next terrorist attack, and then, we'll lose a few more freedoms...and then some more and then a few more.

[charles]

so confident that government power will NEVER be turned against you that you don't care what is done as long as somebody tells you its keeping you safe from the evil muslim terrorists. Pathetic.

a) wrong

b)there are evil muslim terrorists, who weren't watched closely enough before 9/11

military intelligence is not domestically applicable

"when one side is suspected by the gov. of having terrorist ties."

that's the third time you've changed your assertion

"Don't bother responding."

fuck you right back. johnny

[southdakotaboy]

Lets try this from a slightly different angle nonwinger. The other day I was driving out of town and was stopped at a roadblock. The police came up and asked me for my drivers license and chit chated with me for a few minutes. It was a drunk driving check point. I hadn't been breaking the law so the had no probable cause to stop me, they were stopping everyone. However, the only people they were arresting were people who were driving drunk. Do you think this is an illegal act and if so does that mean you think it is alright to let people be killed by drunk drivers?

[nowingker]

I NEVER changed my assertion asswipe, apparently the use of different words is considered a 'change' LOL.

The government says it can spy on Americans without a warrant if it believes one of the parties to the communication has terrorist ties.

That means

a) the American citizen may not be suspected of being a terrorist, sympathizing with a terrorist but could be INNOCENT of any wrong doing or wrong thinking, simply communicating with this 'alleged' terrorist is enough to get your email and phone calls monitored.

b) since the government asserts the right to conduct this surveillance without a warrant there is no third party evaluation of whether the other party to the communication is a terrorist, has terrorist ties or even if there is any evidence at all that these allegations are true or whether there exists any probable cause or evidence that supports the governments belief that the foreign national is a terrorist.

[nowingker]

Do you think this is an illegal act and if so does that mean you think it is alright to let people be killed by drunk drivers?

--------------------------

Yes, I think it is an illegal and unconstitutional act to randomly stop someone as part of a drunk driving road block when they exhibit no signs of being a drunk driver. Unfortunately, the supreme court doesn't agree w/me here.

The second part of your questions is pure straw man, since unless we have a drunk driving roadblock every couple of miles we aren't going to stop drunk drivers from killing people.

I can do two things at once. I can be against drunk driving and desire that drunk drivers be prosecuted and ALSO be against random road blocks that I consider unreasonable and unconstitutional.

[charles]

"I NEVER changed my assertion asswipe, apparently the use of different words is considered a 'change' "

if you say so,

a) the American citizen may not be suspected of being a terrorist, sympathizing with a terrorist but could be INNOCENT of any wrong doing or wrong thinking, simply communicating with this 'alleged' terrorist is enough to get your email and phone calls monitored.

b) since the government asserts the right to conduct this surveillance without a warrant there is no third party evaluation of whether the other party to the communication is a terrorist, has terrorist ties or even if there is any evidence at all that these allegations are true or whether there exists any probable cause or evidence that supports the governments belief that the foreign national is a terrorist.

and you are wrong again

[Tom]

Contrary to popular belief on the left there have not been massive roundups of people who disagree with the Government. Nor have has there been a suspension of our constitution. The simple fact that we can sit here and talk about this and each some links "proving" our side means that our government is acting in an open and accountable fashion. When we can sit here and talk about these things like we have kind of puts the whole lefty argument out the window.

Posted by: southdakotaboy

A bigger idiot has never drawn a breath...Lets see: We DO have massive roundups of people. Ask those in Gitmo or the orther 'black sites' all over the world. So you are wrong here. Our constitution has been 'suspended' when habeas is taken away (it has), when the 4th amendment has been shredded (it has), politicalization of the justice dept (it has), etc...I could on and on about this, but I would suggest you learn to read on your own. So because we are allowed to 'speak', we have our rights? You are such an fool. Please don't have any children. Please. I can't think of a more awful joke to pull on the world than for you to reproduce. God you are a pathetic whiny baby...Look out! their coming to git ya!

[charles]

A bigger idiot has never drawn a breath...orther, politicalization,such an fool, their coming to git ya!

i concur

[nowingker]

The wingers are too bound by their fear of another terrorist attack to care about pesky things like the fouth amendment, the encroachment of executive power or the using of the federal bureaucracy as a wing of the GOP.

When confronted with any evidence, even the writings of the Founding Fathers who so pointedly wrote about the dangers of government power the best they can do is cry that the GWOT is different. Of course thinking people know that Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin and George Washington all knew that government excess derives from a desire to do 'good' not to oppress for the sake of opression. They don't care because the terrorists hate us for our freedom and want to establish Sharia law here in the U.S. and we have to fight them over there instead of over here.

[Zifnab]

'You know you pull up to the curb in front of your sweetie's apartment where she's waiting with her Dell PC laptop, Starbucks latte, and her feet ensconced in worn Birkenstocks, and you turn down "Not Ready to Make Nice" and holler, "Get in the truck, bitch."'

Touche, Pheonix. Touche.

[charles]

you are obviously a parrot who is young naive and inexperienced, i don't really hold that against you

it's the endless repetition that really tweaks me, the phony clairvoyance and the willfull obtuseness

if you true believers had something better in 2004 than john fucking kerry, we might have avoided all the freekin weeping and moaning

say what you will about bush, but kerry couldn't prevent a second term so he sucks worse ass

say what you want about laura bush but theresa heinz? that's embarrassing, lotsa dough and no class

who from the democrat line up for 2008 is presidential material? another lot of freekin losers

i'll probably be forced into voting for the republicans again because all the other choices suck ass

why is it almost always a choice between bad and worse?

[southdakotaboy]

Tom most of the people in Gitmo you are refering to were put in detention straight from the battle field so you star off wrong and only get worse from there.
Now my whole arguement about the drunk driving road block thing is that the Supreme Court has said that kind of action is ok as long as you do it to everyone hence the same thing applies to checking everyones phone records (which is what we have been talking about) and only going after those who are engaged in terrorist activities.

[Robert]

Mark Steyn still has a writing gig?
Unbelievable.
You'd think that clown would have resigned in disgrace after every one of his predictions about the Iraq War turned out to be wrong.
On top of that, he wanted apologies 30 days after the war started from all those who predicted it right.
Typical rightie. Big fan of accountability for others but not him.
The only time to link to anything Mark Steyn writes is when you can link to his retirement letter. Unless, of course, you running a spoof site.

Hey charles,
Go look at everything you write, and remember these words: The Media is Complicit.
How did Gore lose to W after being the VP during a boom time?
Why are we fighting in Iraq?
How did the worst President we've ever had win re-election?
If Bush is breaking the law, why hasn't he been charged?
How will W and cheney not be brought up on war crime charges?

All the answers are the same: The Media is Complicit.

sdb,
You're right about most of those at Gitmo i suppose.
Sometimes you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet.
So I'm sure you'll have no problem with a long stay in Gitmo for you and your family. Too bad you won't have the ability to show you are innocent.
After all, most of those with you MIGHT be terrorists.

[Robert]

charles,
Don't vote for a republican in '08.
That would be like getting a USSR flag in 1991.
This is the end of the line for the republicans.
Running defecits to pump up their buddies in the military industrial complex to the detriment of all other americans is an unsustainable program.

Americans, despite the media, are starting to catch on.
It's over. We let them rule, and look what we have as a result:
Shiny gifts for Wall St. and middle fingers to Main St.

The Dems aren't much better, but at least they won't screw over real Americans for the better of their corporate croneys 100% of the time, like the republicans. We need to get away from the 2-party system (one-and-a half really), and the death of the Republican Party will be the best way for this to start.
Help get America back on solid footing, don't vote for a Republican.

[A Different Robert]

Yo Robert, ease up on the rethoric please. If you're going to make US/USSR metaphors at least know what you're talking about. This may help: http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/05/boris_yeltsin_lessons_for_amer.php

I'm not so bored as to pick on all your comments; would that I were, you've provided more then ample fodder. Just to hit a few:

Running defecits in the name of income redistribution isn't a sustainable program either.
Dems screw over real Americans for the better of their own type of croney. (wtf does 'real American' mean anyway? Should we be worried about the fake ones?)
If writers quit when history showed them wrong, we'd have long ago stopped hearing from the likes of Dowd or Krugman.

Funny how you could get so much wrong and still arrive at a conclusion I'm heartly behind - getting away from our 'two-party' farce. I don't think we'll get there by not voiting for 'brand-x' (whichever that is) but by voting incumbants out. Every time. You won last time? You lose this time. Period.

That'd make for a interesting political landscape, don't ya think? ;)

[A Different Robert]

"I don't know about you but if the government wants to wire tap my phone they can go ahead. I have nothing to hide as I am sure most people don't."

So much for the 'Land of the free & home of the brave'.

"I always find it amazing how liberals want the Government to have the power to interfere with our lives whenever it is in the interest of the liberal agenda, but they blow a fuse when it is done in order to protect us from criminals and terrorists."

Yeah dude, government interfering with our lives is a bad thing. Be it for the liberal OR conservative agenda, it's not in-line with the rights our founding fathers fought so hard to give to us. Is it so tough to be intellectually consistent? Tapping our phones or passing more Brady-bill type laws... it's all the same.

Here's another once-proud saying that actually meant something in a bygone era. 'Give me liberty or give me death.' Who here thinks *any one* of the signers of the Declaration would allow their phone to be tapped in the name of 'saving us from terrorists'?

[A Different Robert]

One last thought.. Here's another saying that needs some serious consideration.

United we stand, divided we fall.

I'm too young and too historically ignorant to recall any other time in history we've been as divided as we are now, save for the US Civil War. There's a fine line between honest disagreement and blind association with Coke or Pepsi, er, I mean Republican or Democrat. But this nasty in-fighting between us serves no one.

Gentlepeople, we are not so different from one another! We are Americans and we give a damn and we would profit greatly by remembering that.

[Laika's Last Woof]

Being skeptical of religion has nothing to do with race, as -- with only a few rare exceptions -- members of any race may belong to any religion. Therefore it cannot be racism.
Furthermore, religious skepticism happens to be one of the foundations of Western culture. Those who would dare criticize your skepticism are thus guilty of cultural insensitivity which exactly equals and cancels out your own religious insensitivity. QED.
Report suspicious religious activity with a clear conscience. Galileo certainly did.

[Bryce]

"say what you will about bush, but kerry couldn't prevent a second term so he sucks worse ass" -- charles

Interesting logic.

Say what you will about Hitler, but Claus von Stauffenberg couldn't succeed in assassinating him, so he sucks worse ass.

Say what you will about my [entirely hypothetical] drunk, vicious dad, but my mom couldn't stop him from beating her or us kids, so she sucks worse ass.

Say what you will about that rapist, but his victim...

Do you need more? If you think Bush has been a poor president, but blame his failures on the opposition who failed to defeat him, you're going far out of your way to find reasons to hate the opposition. Maybe you have a case of LDS (liberal derangement syndrome). Or are we liberals allowed to blame any failings (real or imagined) of the Clinton administration on Bush Senior and Bob Dole?

[charles]

what is it with you guys and the nazis? it's all i ever see any more, do you love them and want to emulate?

and nice way to miss the point moron, all i'm saying is if you guys can't field a viable candidate then you should shut the fuck up, or go back to the drawing board, you've been on a foaming rampage since before bush was even inaugurated, and personally i've had enough

quit your bitching and do something, all the leftists in this country are nothing but monday morning quarterbacks

the dems have their so called "mandate" what have they actually accomplished to make things better in the us?

so far all i see is show trials and absolutely nothing else

name one thing, just one - oughta be easy right?

your 2008 line up is less than impressive, proof? hillary! is leader of the pack

who are you voting for?

but all you want to do is come in here and spread the hate, i have no use for your silly games

bryce eh, you must be pleased with mom n dad for that one, what a cool name

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