Czar Obama??? Seizes legislative and judicial powers for the Executive Branch - a "One-Man" government in his own mind!

In a stunning turnaround for an act of Congress, a judge ruled
Wednesday that a counterterrorism provision of the National Defense
Authorization Act, an annual defense appropriations bill, is
unconstitutional. Federal district Judge Katherine B. Forrest issued an
injunction against use of the provision on behalf of a group of
journalists and activists who had filed suit in March, claiming it would
chill free speech.

Seven individuals, including Pulitzer
Prize-winning former New York Times foreign correspondent Chris Hedges,
MIT linguist Noam Chomsky and “Pentagon Papers” activist Daniel
Ellsberg, had sued President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Leon
Panetta, and a host of other government officials, stating they were
forced to curtail some of their reporting and activist activities for
fear of violating Section 1021. That section prohibits providing
substantial support for terrorist groups, but gives little definition of
what that means. Environmental activists were also poised to join the
suit if it expanded.

In her decision published Wednesday, Forrest, in the Southern
District of New York, ruled that Section 1021 of NDAA was facially
unconstitutional — a rare finding — because of the potential that it
could violate the 1st Amendment.

“Plaintiffs have stated a more
than plausible claim that the statute inappropriately encroaches on
their rights under the First Amendment,” she wrote, addressing the
constitutional challenge.

Judge Forrest also found that the language
of Section 1021 was too vague, meaning it was too hard to know when one
may or may not be subject to detention.

“It was really unusual
for a judge to declare unconstitutional a major provision of an act of
Congress. I can’t remember the last time that ever happened,” said Carl
Mayer, co-counsel for the plaintiffs. “The judge recognized that, but
felt it was necessary to protect our constitution and to protect our
democracy. There’s a lot of activists who understand how serious this
is, but it’s less well known to the general public.”

The suit
demands that Congress cut or reform this section of the law, which
allows the U.S. military to indefinitely detain without charges anyone —
including U.S. citizens — who may have “substantially supported”
terrorists or their “associated forces,” without defining what those
terms mean. President Obama signed the bill on Dec 31, 2011, with a
signing statement saying that the law was redundant of powers already
provided to the government under the 2001 Authorization for Use of
Military Force (passed after 9/11), and that these powers would not be
used against U.S. citizens. The next administration may decide
differently, however.

The plaintiffs made their cases very clear.
Hedges had said that he could no longer interview some of his contacts
in the Middle East because associating with these individuals might
subject him to indefinite detention. Similarly, one of the founders of
Occupy London, Kai Wargalla, discovered that the city of London Police
Department had categorized her organization as “domestic
terrorism/extremism” — among a list of groups that included Al Qaeda.
Along with her work supporting Wikileaks, she said she felt primed for a
visit from the rendition patrol.

Government attorneys had challenged the issue that any of these people had standing, but Forrest ruled that they did.

I
hadn't heard about it before your email, but here is the story from the
L.A. Times. My question is this - what were John Boehner and a
Republican House of Representatives thinking in givig any president this
power during peace time? This is a situation where a court can hold one
part of a law to be unconstitutional and let the rest remain in
effect. From what I've read, the judge is on solid ground. Ironically,
a lot of leftists like Noahm Chomsky are plaintiffs in the suit -- this
administration would be far more likely to use the power to silence
dissidents from the right. The following is very disconscerting - Obama
has usurped the powers of congress in implementing the DREAM act and
much of Cap & Trade, now he is saying he won't abide by the decision
of a federal court, again! (Recall he was in contempt of court over the
unwarranted ban on offshore drilling in the Gulf!)

RT News
Not only is the White House fighting in court for the power to jail
Americans indefinitely without trial, but the Obama administration is
refusing to tell a federal judge if they’ve abided by an injunction that
prohibits them from such.

Attorneys for the White House have been in-and-out of court in
Manhattan this week to argue that the indefinite detention provisions of
the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012, or NDAA, are necessary
for the safety and security of the nation. When President Barack Obama signed the
bill on December 31, he granted the government the power to put any
American away in jail over even suspected terrorist ties, but federal
court Judge Katherine Forrest ruled in May that this particular part of
the NDAA, Section 1021, failed to “pass constitutional muster” and ordered a temporary injunction.



On Monday, White House attorneys asked for an appeal for
that injunction so that they’d be once more legally permitted to
indefinitely detain anyone over mere accusations. When specifically
asked to answer whether or not they’ve adhered by Judge Forrest’s
injunction so far, though, administration attorneys refused to cooperate
with the questioning.

Activist and reporter Tangerine Bolen is a plaintiff in the case
against the NDAA, and in an op-ed published Thursday in the Daily
Cloudt, she writes that the federal attorneys asking for an appeal have
declined to reveal whether or not they’ve cooperated with the judge’s
May 2012 injunction. If the government has arrested anyone over alleged“belligerent ties” since Judge Forrest ordered a temporary stay, the government could be in contempt of court.

“Obama’s attorneys refused to assure the court, when questioned,
that the NDAA’s section 1021 – the provision that permits reporters and
others who have not committed crimes to be detained without trial – has
not been applied by the US government anywhere in the world after Judge
Forrest’s injunction,” Tangerine tells Daily Cloudt. “In other
words, they were telling a US federal judge that they could not, or
would not, state whether Obama’s government had complied with the legal
injunction that she had laid down before them.”