Is FISA Not Clear Enough?
The New York Times has a good editorial today on Bush's insistence that his executive orders allowing domestic warrantless monitoring of conversations was in accord with the Constitution and our nation's laws.
President Bush defended the program yesterday, saying it was saving lives, hotly insisting that he was working within the Constitution and the law, and denouncing The Times for disclosing the program's existence. We don't know if he was right on the first count; this White House has cried wolf so many times on the urgency of national security threats that it has lost all credibility. But we have learned the hard way that Mr. Bush's team cannot be trusted to find the boundaries of the law, much less respect them.
Mr. Bush said he would not retract his secret directive or halt the illegal spying, so Congress should find a way to force him to do it. Perhaps the Congressional leaders who were told about the program could get the ball rolling.
What section of FISA do the Bush advisors not understand? Glenn Greenewald makes his case here .
The only way to argue that the Bush Administration’s warrantless eavesdropping on suspected terrorists, including U.S. citizens, complied with the law is by misquoting the law in order to change its requirements.
As to the credibility of Bush officials on this issue, Think Progress points out:
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