At CPAC, Rand Paul Blasts Obama on Civil Liberties

[jct74]

At CPAC, Rand Paul Blasts Obama on Civil Liberties

By PATRICK O'CONNOR
Mar 7, 2014 4:38 pm

OXON HILL, Md. — Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul brought the house down Friday at one of the country’s largest summits for grassroots conservatives with a stinging indictment of President Barack Obama and an impassioned plea to defend civil liberties.

...

The Kentucky senator’s speech was peppered with provocative language, delivered as a call-to-arms for conservatives. His primary target was Obama administration detention and surveillance programs that, in his view, violate basic rights guaranteed under the constitution.

“If you have a cell phone, you are under surveillance. I believe what you do on your cell phone is none of their damn business,” Mr. Paul said to rousing applause.

...

Throughout the speech, the Kentucky senator touched on familiar themes, questioning whether the federal government can use a single warrant to justify the collection of phone records from millions of Americans and declaring that the Fourth Amendment prohibition on illegal searches every bit as important as the Second Amendment right to bear arms.

The ever-eclectic Mr. Paul quoted Daniel Webster, 18th Century French philosopher Montesquieu and Pink Floyd frontman Roger Waters. He made repeated references to the country’s history of racial inequality, arguing that loose interpretations of the Constitution led to Jim Crow laws in the South and the imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

...

read more:
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/03/07/rand-paul-blasts-obama-on-civil-liberties/

 

[jct74]

US near 'tyranny' under Obama, says Republican

(AFP) – March 7, 2014

National Harbor (United States) — Senator Rand Paul, a potential Republican White House contender in 2016, electrified conservative activists Friday by warning that President Barack Obama was taking America down the road to tyranny.

...

At least four other potential White House candidates addressed CPAC -- Senator Ted Cruz, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Texas Governor Rick Perry and former senator Rick Santorum -- as the race slowly but steadily heats up for who will replace Obama when his second term ends.

It was Paul who perhaps most effectively drew listeners to the issue of the Constitution and how Obama is putting its personal protections under threat.

"A great president would have protected us from the prying eyes of the NSA," he said. "A great president would have proclaimed I will not abide it, the Constitution will not abide it."

...

If the executive branch can initiate war, amend legislation or detain people without trial, he said in a reference to war-on-terror detainees at the US Naval prison at Guantanamo Bay, "then government unrestrained by law becomes nothing short of tyranny."

...

read more:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/af...sQ?docId=03abf0ed-450b-4d7d-822a-cb7c7dec6640