U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney threw out a lawsuit against the FBI for illegally spying on Muslims in Orange County, CA. "The state secrets privilege may unfortunately mean the sacrifice of individual liberties for the sake of national security," he explained. (Via Reason)

  • dmatos

    Didn’t somebody famous once say something about sacrificing a little bit of liberty in order to obtain a little bit of security?

    • http://mordicai.livejournal.com Mordicai

       Psh, unless it is a Founding Father, who caaaaares!

  • kiergsmith

    They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

    1775 – Benjamin Franklin

  • californiadiver

    I guess that judge isn’t familiar with Benjamin Franklin…
    “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”  http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin

  • Brainspore

    Benjamin Franklin! JINX!

  • corollax

    For a man tasked with upholding the principles of the constitution, you’d certainly expect him to have a better understanding of the men who wrote it what else they wrote with it.

  • http://twitter.com/SargeMisfit Sarge Misfit

    “The state secrets privilege may unfortunately mean the sacrifice of individual liberties for the sake of national security”

    I can think of other nations which have enjoyed such a privilege …

    USSR (which fell apart)
    China
    North Korea

    • Antinous / Moderator

      Can you name one country anywhere, ever that hasn’t done this?

      • retepslluerb

        These other countries usually do produce an ongodly amount of propaganda how enlightened they are and how this and that could never happen at home. 

  • http://www.karljones.com karl_jones

    I particularly dislike the word “unfortunately” in the phrase:

    The state secrets privilege may unfortunately mean the sacrifice of individual liberties for the sake of national security …

    Don’t tell me it’s unfortunate, Judge.

    Declarations of Fortune and non-Fortune are outside your purview.

    You judged, Judge.

    Not Fortune: you.

    • EH

      The “funny” thing about that is that the state secrets “privilege” is 110% informal. There is 0 law on the topic.

      • Brainspore

        Actually the Supreme Court first formally recognized the “state secrets privilege” in United States v. Reynolds in 1953. 

        Ironically, the case that set this precedent was itself based on lies, since recently declassified documents showed that the case didn’t even involve any state secrets but the government abused the claim so they wouldn’t have to pay damages to the plaintiffs.

        • EH

          Which was the court basically saying, “Yeah, you can use it with us. We’re cool with it.” There is still no legislation, though.

          • Brainspore

            There’s no legislation that explicitly states women have a right to seek abortions, but it would be misleading to say “there is zero law on the topic” in the era of Roe v. Wade.

          • EH

            True, and now you’ve given me an idea. If state secrets can be hacked down the same way abortion rights have been…

  • http://mordicai.livejournal.com Mordicai

    The cynical part of me might conclude that the damage to the state might come from the fact that there is a massive racially motivated witch hunt?  I mean, I could see how that could be a danger, if people ever found out about it.

    • http://twitter.com/abstract_reg Reg Robson

      Wait, you are suggesting that there is a racially motivated witch-hunt in the United States? Which one are you talking about, I can think of three off the top of my head.

      • http://mordicai.livejournal.com Mordicai

        Oh god, is there a German word for when you laugh but it is like, the saddest laugh?

        • http://www.karljones.com karl_jones

          Yiddish must surely have a word for The Saddest Laugh.

          • Bottle Imp

            “Lakhn mit yashcherkes” i.e. laughing with the lizards or laughing through tears.

          • http://mordicai.livejournal.com Mordicai

            I should have paid more attention to The Yiddish Policeman’s Union…

  • wysinwyg

    This ruling may unfortunately mean the radicalization of individuals to the detriment of national security.

    Did I say “unfortunately”?  Not sure whether I meant it.

    • http://twitter.com/cocktail_shaker The Mixologist

       That’s not a bug, that’s a feature!

      • http://www.karljones.com karl_jones

        If it’s a feature, we charge more money.

        If it’s a bug, we save money.

  • creesto

    I wanna know when they gonna start wiretappn some of these crazy ass honkey MoFos with their automatic weapons and bad mojo!!
    <>

  • Ian Anthony

    For the full story about what happened here, check out the latest episode of This American Life, which is literally about this very story. Its a shame to see their lawsuit got thrown out.

  • ToddBradley

    Does anyone else find it strange there are two dozen comments on the BB article and zero on the original LA Times article? Why do BB readers care so much when LA Times readers care so little?

    • Antinous / Moderator

      Because it doesn’t involve celebrities?

    • billstewart

      The LA Times commenting system has become increasingly hard to use since the last time they changed implementations (something Facebook-based, I think, but it’s far more broken than BB’s adoption of Disqus.)  They used to have a reasonable collection of commenters, but now it tends to be a few trolls and spammers.

  • billstewart

    There’s a perfectly reasonable way for the judge to have accommodated state secrets without violating the Constitution: “Defendant, if you don’t want to give evidence that would exonerate you (because of national security or state secrets or general embarrassment),  you can just plead the 5th and let the jury decide how much to award you.”  If the government doesn’t want to have to pay that much, well, that’s the price of not telling the truth.