PJC Journal – Original

In the UK, the Conservative Party have published
what they call a new Ministerial Code as a starting point to tackle the glut of
lies and deceit coming out of Whitehall.

The Conservative
Party's Democracy Taskforce, chaired by Kenneth Clarke, has called for a new
Ministerial Code designed to ensure that Government becomes more open,
democratic, and accountable to Parliament. 

The former
Conservative Chancellor warned: “A personal, Presidential, off-the-cuff,
accident-prone style of Government has grown enormously under Tony Blair. It
will increase and become more personal and authoritarian under Gordon Brown.”

The report
recommends a new system to entrench a process of collective Cabinet government,
requiring the introduction of a strengthened Ministerial Code, covering the
required procedures for approval of policies by the Cabinet. To give the new
Ministerial Code authority, it should be approved by a Parliamentary
resolution.

The Taskforce also recommends that responsibility for monitoring the Code
should be taken out of the hands of the Prime Minister and placed in the hands
of a body with powers comparable to those of the National Audit Office, which
reports to a Parliamentary Committee.

In addition, the paper says the Committee on Standards in Public Life should
establish a code of conduct covering government publications and advertising
campaigns; decisions to go to war, or to commit troops to areas of conflict,
should require Parliamentary approval. And decisions on war-making should no
longer rest solely on the unfettered use of the Royal Prerogative by the Prime
Minister

And treaties with financial, legal, or territorial implications for the United
Kingdom or its citizens should require Parliamentary approval before
ratification and should no longer involve the use of the Royal Prerogative

The report states: “We believe that in recent years, the combination of an
over-powerful premiership and the dominance of news management within
policy-making have been very damaging to both effective and accountable
government.

“Cabinet government has been all but destroyed. Most ministers have become
little more than the presentational vehicles for the policies of political
appointees in Number Ten. Presentation has led policy. The Civil Service has
been left to carry the blame for policies that have proved impossible to
implement. Parliament has been expected to be the Prime Minister's poodle.”

 

What it
doesn’t do is give specific undertakings to roll back dangerous and intrusive
legislation, stop the database state in its tracks or to cease the technology
led surveillances of UK citizens. It’s a start, but
there is much more for the Tories to sign up to if they want our trust and
votes. 

 

Meanwhile, in the
US, opposition groups have put together a
much more specific Agenda, which they are asking the 2008 presidential
candidates to sign up to.
 

Ed Brayton writes
on Positive
Liberty, as US based blog.

I got a call from
Jim Babka of Downsize DC the other day and he mentioned the
announcement of the American
Freedom Agenda by a group of prominent conservatives. It’s an interesting
group: Bruce Fein, former DOJ official under Reagan and prominent legal
scholar; David Keene of the American Conservative Union; Bob Barr, former
Georgia Congressman; and Richard Viguerie, who may not be a well known name but
is probably the man most responsible for the election of Ronald Reagan and the
formation of the modern conservative movement. 

What makes it all
the more interesting is the position they are taking: they are pushing a raft
of reforms that would push back Bush’s “unitary executive” agenda and restore
checks and balances to government.

They are taking a
strong stand against a wide range of Bush policies – the warrantless
wiretapping program, the use of presidential signing statements as de facto
vetoes, extraordinary rendition, the use of torture, the military commissions
act, and much more. They are asking 2008 presidential candidates to sign the Freedom
Pledge, the text of which is set out below.
 

I, (candidate),
hereby pledge that if elected President of the United States I will undertake
the following to restore the Constitution’s checks and balances, to honor
fundamental protections against injustice, and to eschew usurpations of
legislative or judicial power. These are keystones of national security and
individual freedom:

1. No Military Commissions Except on the Battlefield.
I will not employ military commissions to prosecute offences against the laws
of war except in places where active hostilities are ongoing and a battlefield
tribunal is necessary to obtain fresh testimony and to prevent local anarchy or
chaos.

2. No Evidence Extracted by Torture or Coercion.
I will not permit the use of evidence obtained by torture or coercion to be
admissible in a military commission or other tribunal. 

3. No Detaining Citizens as Unlawful Enemy Combatants.
I will not detain any American citizen as an unlawful enemy combatant. Citizens
accused of terrorism-linked crimes will be prosecuted in federal civilian
courts.

4. Restoring Habeas Corpus for Suspected Alien Enemy
Combatants. I will detain non-citizens as enemy combatants only
if they have actively participated in actual hostilities against the United States. I will urge Congress to amend the
Military Commissions Act of 2006 to permit any individual detained under the
custody or control of the United States government to file a petition for a writ
of habeas corpus in federal courts. 

5. Prohibiting Warrantless Spying by the National
Security Agency in Violation of Law. I will prohibit the
National Security Agency from gathering foreign intelligence except in
conformity with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, and end the
NSA’s domestic surveillance program that targets American citizens on American
soil for warrantless electronic surveillance.

6. Renouncing Presidential Signing Statements.
I will not issue presidential signing statements declaring the intent to
disregard provisions of a bill that I have signed into law because I believe
they are unconstitutional. Instead, I will veto any bill that I believe
contains an unconstitutional provision and ask Congress to delete it and
re-pass the legislation. 

7. Ending Secret Government by Invoking State Secrets
Privilege. I will not invoke the state secrets privilege to
deny remedies to individuals victimized by constitutional violations
perpetrated by government officials or agents. I will not assert executive
privilege to deny Congress information relevant to oversight or legislation
unless supreme state secrets are involved. In that case, I will submit the
privilege claim to a legislative-executive committee for definitive resolution.

8. Stopping Extraordinary Renditions. I
will order the cessation of extraordinary renditions except where the purpose
of the capture and transportation of the suspected criminal is for prosecution
according to internationally accepted standards of fairness and due process. 

9. Stopping Threats to Prosecuting Journalists under the
Espionage Act. I will urge Congress to amend the Espionage Act
to create a journalistic exception for reporting on matters relating to the
national defence. As a matter of prosecutorial discretion, until such an
amendment is enacted I will not prosecute journalists for alleged Espionage Act
violations except for the intentional disclosure of information that threatens
immediate physical harm to American troops or citizens at home or abroad.

10. Ending the Listing of Individuals or Organizations as
Terrorists Based on Secret Evidence. I will not list
individuals or organizations as foreign terrorists or foreign terrorist
organizations for purposes of United States or international law based on secret
evidence. I will issue a public report annually elaborating on how the actions
enumerated in paragraphs 1-10 have strengthened the ability of the United States to defeat international terrorism, secure
fundamental freedoms, and preserve the nation’s democratic dispensation.

 

It’s an
extraordinary list of grievances and they are right on every one of them. It’s
interesting that these are all virtually identical to the positions taken by
the ACLU and most liberals and libertarians over the last few years, so it is
certainly refreshing to see such prominent conservatives agreeing with those
positions and joining the fight against the unconstitutional policies of the
Bush administration.
 

Is it possible
that Bush has gone so far that he has actually managed to unite liberals,
conservatives and libertarians in support of the Constitution? One can only
hope.

It is becoming
clear that opposition parties are recognising the upswell of public opinion
against the totalitarian moves of Blair, Brown and Bush. 

Now we need to
get the Media to get this message across to the public at large, before they no
longer have the right to print what they want.

 

In the UK, the Conservative Party have published
what they call a new Ministerial Code as a starting point to tackle the glut of
lies and deceit coming out of Whitehall.

The Conservative
Party's Democracy Taskforce, chaired by Kenneth Clarke, has called for a new
Ministerial Code designed to ensure that Government becomes more open,
democratic, and accountable to Parliament. 

The former
Conservative Chancellor warned: “A personal, Presidential, off-the-cuff,
accident-prone style of Government has grown enormously under Tony Blair. It
will increase and become more personal and authoritarian under Gordon Brown.”

The report
recommends a new system to entrench a process of collective Cabinet government,
requiring the introduction of a strengthened Ministerial Code, covering the
required procedures for approval of policies by the Cabinet. To give the new
Ministerial Code authority, it should be approved by a Parliamentary
resolution.

The Taskforce also recommends that responsibility for monitoring the Code
should be taken out of the hands of the Prime Minister and placed in the hands
of a body with powers comparable to those of the National Audit Office, which
reports to a Parliamentary Committee.

In addition, the paper says the Committee on Standards in Public Life should
establish a code of conduct covering government publications and advertising
campaigns; decisions to go to war, or to commit troops to areas of conflict,
should require Parliamentary approval. And decisions on war-making should no
longer rest solely on the unfettered use of the Royal Prerogative by the Prime
Minister

And treaties with financial, legal, or territorial implications for the United
Kingdom or its citizens should require Parliamentary approval before
ratification and should no longer involve the use of the Royal Prerogative

The report states: “We believe that in recent years, the combination of an
over-powerful premiership and the dominance of news management within
policy-making have been very damaging to both effective and accountable
government.

“Cabinet government has been all but destroyed. Most ministers have become
little more than the presentational vehicles for the policies of political
appointees in Number Ten. Presentation has led policy. The Civil Service has
been left to carry the blame for policies that have proved impossible to
implement. Parliament has been expected to be the Prime Minister's poodle.”

 

What it
doesn’t do is give specific undertakings to roll back dangerous and intrusive
legislation, stop the database state in its tracks or to cease the technology
led surveillances of UK citizens. It’s a start, but
there is much more for the Tories to sign up to if they want our trust and
votes. 

 

Meanwhile, in the
US, opposition groups have put together a
much more specific Agenda, which they are asking the 2008 presidential
candidates to sign up to.
 

Ed Brayton writes
on Positive
Liberty, as US based blog.

I got a call from
Jim Babka of Downsize DC the other day and he mentioned the
announcement of the American
Freedom Agenda by a group of prominent conservatives. It’s an interesting
group: Bruce Fein, former DOJ official under Reagan and prominent legal
scholar; David Keene of the American Conservative Union; Bob Barr, former
Georgia Congressman; and Richard Viguerie, who may not be a well known name but
is probably the man most responsible for the election of Ronald Reagan and the
formation of the modern conservative movement. 

What makes it all
the more interesting is the position they are taking: they are pushing a raft
of reforms that would push back Bush’s “unitary executive” agenda and restore
checks and balances to government.

They are taking a
strong stand against a wide range of Bush policies – the warrantless
wiretapping program, the use of presidential signing statements as de facto
vetoes, extraordinary rendition, the use of torture, the military commissions
act, and much more. They are asking 2008 presidential candidates to sign the Freedom
Pledge, the text of which is set out below.
 

I, (candidate),
hereby pledge that if elected President of the United States I will undertake
the following to restore the Constitution’s checks and balances, to honor
fundamental protections against injustice, and to eschew usurpations of
legislative or judicial power. These are keystones of national security and
individual freedom:

1. No Military Commissions Except on the Battlefield.
I will not employ military commissions to prosecute offences against the laws
of war except in places where active hostilities are ongoing and a battlefield
tribunal is necessary to obtain fresh testimony and to prevent local anarchy or
chaos.

2. No Evidence Extracted by Torture or Coercion.
I will not permit the use of evidence obtained by torture or coercion to be
admissible in a military commission or other tribunal. 

3. No Detaining Citizens as Unlawful Enemy Combatants.
I will not detain any American citizen as an unlawful enemy combatant. Citizens
accused of terrorism-linked crimes will be prosecuted in federal civilian
courts.

4. Restoring Habeas Corpus for Suspected Alien Enemy
Combatants. I will detain non-citizens as enemy combatants only
if they have actively participated in actual hostilities against the United States. I will urge Congress to amend the
Military Commissions Act of 2006 to permit any individual detained under the
custody or control of the United States government to file a petition for a writ
of habeas corpus in federal courts. 

5. Prohibiting Warrantless Spying by the National
Security Agency in Violation of Law. I will prohibit the
National Security Agency from gathering foreign intelligence except in
conformity with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, and end the
NSA’s domestic surveillance program that targets American citizens on American
soil for warrantless electronic surveillance.

6. Renouncing Presidential Signing Statements.
I will not issue presidential signing statements declaring the intent to
disregard provisions of a bill that I have signed into law because I believe
they are unconstitutional. Instead, I will veto any bill that I believe
contains an unconstitutional provision and ask Congress to delete it and
re-pass the legislation. 

7. Ending Secret Government by Invoking State Secrets
Privilege. I will not invoke the state secrets privilege to
deny remedies to individuals victimized by constitutional violations
perpetrated by government officials or agents. I will not assert executive
privilege to deny Congress information relevant to oversight or legislation
unless supreme state secrets are involved. In that case, I will submit the
privilege claim to a legislative-executive committee for definitive resolution.

8. Stopping Extraordinary Renditions. I
will order the cessation of extraordinary renditions except where the purpose
of the capture and transportation of the suspected criminal is for prosecution
according to internationally accepted standards of fairness and due process. 

9. Stopping Threats to Prosecuting Journalists under the
Espionage Act. I will urge Congress to amend the Espionage Act
to create a journalistic exception for reporting on matters relating to the
national defence. As a matter of prosecutorial discretion, until such an
amendment is enacted I will not prosecute journalists for alleged Espionage Act
violations except for the intentional disclosure of information that threatens
immediate physical harm to American troops or citizens at home or abroad.

10. Ending the Listing of Individuals or Organizations as
Terrorists Based on Secret Evidence. I will not list
individuals or organizations as foreign terrorists or foreign terrorist
organizations for purposes of United States or international law based on secret
evidence. I will issue a public report annually elaborating on how the actions
enumerated in paragraphs 1-10 have strengthened the ability of the United States to defeat international terrorism, secure
fundamental freedoms, and preserve the nation’s democratic dispensation.

 

It’s an
extraordinary list of grievances and they are right on every one of them. It’s
interesting that these are all virtually identical to the positions taken by
the ACLU and most liberals and libertarians over the last few years, so it is
certainly refreshing to see such prominent conservatives agreeing with those
positions and joining the fight against the unconstitutional policies of the
Bush administration.
 

Is it possible
that Bush has gone so far that he has actually managed to unite liberals,
conservatives and libertarians in support of the Constitution? One can only
hope.

It is becoming
clear that opposition parties are recognising the upswell of public opinion
against the totalitarian moves of Blair, Brown and Bush. 

Now we need to
get the Media to get this message across to the public at large, before they no
longer have the right to print what they want.

 

Henry Porter
writes in the Guardian,
One of the things about British society that is very hard to understand is the
almost complete lack of popular concern about the imminence of the surveillance
society. Perhaps it is part of the disengagement with politics – the general
checking-out from issues that seem not to impinge on our immediate comfort and
wellbeing.  

But there can be
no mistake after the
report by the Royal Academy of Engineering, Dilemmas of Privacy and Surveillance
- Challenges of Technological Change, that we ignore what is happening at our
peril and that we have a very short time to act.

“There is a choice,” say the
authors of the report, “between a Big Brother world where individual
privacy is almost extinct and a world where the data being kept by individual
organisations or services are protected and kept secret.”

Add to this the
frantic construction of government databases – the NHS spine, the ID card
scheme's National Identity Register (NIR), the police DNA data base and the now total surveillance
of British motorways and town centres by a system that retains journey details
for two years – and you realise that the surveillance society is not so much
imminent as a clear and present danger. It should take no imagination to see
that apart from fundamentally altering the human experience, a surveillance
society reduces individual liberty and makes each one of us much more open to
abuse from the state and big corporations. 

This report is to
be welcomed because it is produced not by politically motivated liberals, but
by scientists who understand the power and reach of surveillance technology.

Richard
Thomas, the information commissioner said much the same thing in an excellent
report last November that criticised the NIR. And there are signs that the
penny is beginning to drop on all sides of the house. The cross-party home
affairs select committee is to look
into the impact of widespread CCTV, the NIR and the police DNA database.  

It is little
appreciated that each generation must fight for its freedom and the freedom of
its children in distinct ways. We have become complacent about our liberties as
though they were in our blood, part of a gene pool of democratic virtues that
very few other nations are fortunate enough to possess.

In Britain, right across Europe, the USA and Australia, all of its citizens are being faced with
the same draconian repressive legislation, the same arguments, the same removal
of rights, the same invasive technology and the same propaganda.  

The Say No to ID
cards movement is growing, but not at a fast enough rate. Are we citizens really aware
of what's going on around us, right around the world, and how far the
authoritarians have come? Do we understand their strategies and tactics? The
answer is a resounding “No!”

To compliment the report a full length American made documentary film is
primarily about the serious issue of taxes; its thesis is that there is not
actually a law in the USA requiring the lodgement of income tax
forms. No law, in fact, that allows the imposition of income tax. I recommend
this film to non-Americans as well as Americans, for more reasons than I can
say.

The film is directed by Aaron
Russo, who was manager for Bette Midler from 1972 to 1979 and The Manhattan
Transfer, and the producer of the films The
Rose, Trading Places
and Wise Guys. Russo has
personally won both an Emmy and a Tony award and his films have also won a
number of Golden Globe awards.

America -
Freedom to Fascism is a must-see despite its off-putting title. And it's a
must-see-right-through, because some of the most important material, about RFIDs, (Radio Frequency ID) the
technology behind the ePassports and the ID Cards, is at the end.

 

Henry Porter
writes in the Guardian,
One of the things about British society that is very hard to understand is the
almost complete lack of popular concern about the imminence of the surveillance
society. Perhaps it is part of the disengagement with politics – the general
checking-out from issues that seem not to impinge on our immediate comfort and
wellbeing.  

But there can be
no mistake after the
report by the Royal Academy of Engineering, Dilemmas of Privacy and Surveillance
- Challenges of Technological Change, that we ignore what is happening at our
peril and that we have a very short time to act.

“There is a choice,” say the
authors of the report, “between a Big Brother world where individual
privacy is almost extinct and a world where the data being kept by individual
organisations or services are protected and kept secret.”

Add to this the
frantic construction of government databases – the NHS spine, the ID card
scheme's National Identity Register (NIR), the police DNA data base and the now total surveillance
of British motorways and town centres by a system that retains journey details
for two years – and you realise that the surveillance society is not so much
imminent as a clear and present danger. It should take no imagination to see
that apart from fundamentally altering the human experience, a surveillance
society reduces individual liberty and makes each one of us much more open to
abuse from the state and big corporations. 

This report is to
be welcomed because it is produced not by politically motivated liberals, but
by scientists who understand the power and reach of surveillance technology.

Richard
Thomas, the information commissioner said much the same thing in an excellent
report last November that criticised the NIR. And there are signs that the
penny is beginning to drop on all sides of the house. The cross-party home
affairs select committee is to look
into the impact of widespread CCTV, the NIR and the police DNA database.  

It is little
appreciated that each generation must fight for its freedom and the freedom of
its children in distinct ways. We have become complacent about our liberties as
though they were in our blood, part of a gene pool of democratic virtues that
very few other nations are fortunate enough to possess.

In Britain, right across Europe, the USA and Australia, all of its citizens are being faced with
the same draconian repressive legislation, the same arguments, the same removal
of rights, the same invasive technology and the same propaganda.  

The Say No to ID
cards movement is growing, but not at a fast enough rate. Are we citizens really aware
of what's going on around us, right around the world, and how far the
authoritarians have come? Do we understand their strategies and tactics? The
answer is a resounding “No!”

To compliment the report a full length American made documentary film is
primarily about the serious issue of taxes; its thesis is that there is not
actually a law in the USA requiring the lodgement of income tax
forms. No law, in fact, that allows the imposition of income tax. I recommend
this film to non-Americans as well as Americans, for more reasons than I can
say.

The film is directed by Aaron
Russo, who was manager for Bette Midler from 1972 to 1979 and The Manhattan
Transfer, and the producer of the films The
Rose, Trading Places
and Wise Guys. Russo has
personally won both an Emmy and a Tony award and his films have also won a
number of Golden Globe awards.

America -
Freedom to Fascism is a must-see despite its off-putting title. And it's a
must-see-right-through, because some of the most important material, about RFIDs, (Radio Frequency ID) the
technology behind the ePassports and the ID Cards, is at the end.

 

TONY Blair is secretly
backing plans to create a permanent President of Europe. It is now being
discussed as part of negotiations in  Berlin aimed at reviving the Constitution without sparking
more referendums.

It was reported in the Daily
Express that Kim Darroch, Mr Blair’s personal envoy to the EU, has been told to
use the negotiations to press for a permanent EU president to replace the
current system, in which the presidency rotates among the member states every
six months.

The Prime Minister would be one of the favourites for the job, which would go
to a former EU leader. His main rival would be the outgoing French president
Jacques Chirac, who has clashed with Mr Blair over the future of Europe many times during the past decade.

The president
would be appointed by other EU leaders, rather than being directly elected.
Neil O’Brien, director of the independent think tank Open Europe, warned that
the new president would inevitably gain more powers as time went on.

Mr O’Brien said: “It is very hard to see how the president would be accountable
to the people. As for who could do it, Tony Blair would be an obvious
candidate.” 

Meanwhile plans
by the German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the heads of state to sign a
declaration of faith in the EU collapsed last week. Instead, only unelected
heads of the EU’s main institutions signed the document.

A majority in EU countries want a referendum on any new constitution, a poll
found.

“The
further back you look, the further forward you can see.” (Winston
Churchill)