That is why the argument that the broad application of something like use of force to something like wiretapping is flawed, because if you accept that logic, there is literally pretty much nothing you can’t apply the same argument to, thereby giving them a free pass to ignore any laws they choose to.

There may be other arguments out there that don’t involve the reasoning that the use of force authorization overriding the illegality of the wiretaps, but that is the position that Gonzales and the Bush administration have taken, so that’s what I’m discussing.

Sure, there may be other legal loopholes which some could use to excuse the behavior, as to whether or not it is technically illegal, but even if that is so, I still believe it is wrong, as is lying about it to cover it up.

The Truong court [United States v. Truong Dinh Hung, 4th Cir. 1980], as did all the other courts to have decided the issue, held that the President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches to obtain foreign intelligence information. *** We take for granted that the President does have that authority and, assuming that is so, FISA could not encroach on the President’s constitutional power.

To make this into some big thing about Bush trying to make a case for being allowed to walk up to random people in the street is and shoot them in the head is absurd demagoguery–this is about a narrow issue of gathering foreign intelligence information. I think any “clear-thinking, honest person”–especially one without legal expertise–would have to at least concede that there are nuanced arguments for and against the program and that specific details of the program are needed to make a final judgment.

As for trying to distract from the issues in this post (current events) by bringing up things that happened in the previous administration (such as Kosovo and Waco), I don’t really think it’s a valid point.

Firstly, I, along with most other people, didn’t have a blog back when those things were happening. If I did, I’m sure I would have posts to reference for you (although there certainly was plenty of news coverage, unless you were living under a rock).

Usually when I make posts on my blog about subjects like this, they involve current events. It would be pretty difficult to try and make sure I went back through history and tried to give equal time / posting space to everything else that has ever occurred.

In any event, you are completely wrong when you suggest that this post is motivated by a hatred of Bush and/or republicans, because it most certainly is not. It is also in no way an attempt to “politicize” the Iraq war. So please don’t try to dismiss anyone who you don’t agree with by trying to ascribe inferior motives to their words or actions.

I post on this stuff because I think it matters. I don’t “hate” Bush or republicans, and I’ve said so too many times on here for you to even suggest that. I also despise any attempt to use issues like the Iraq invasion/occupation and/or 9/11 for “political” purposes, and have spoken out against both republicans and democrats for doing just that consistently in the last few years. No one else has even come close to politicizing 9/11 the way the current administration has, but I criticize such attempts regardless of who perpetrates them.

Speaking of history, however, if you told the soldiers that have given their lives for this country’s freedom throughout our history that there would eventually be an administration in office that created “free speech zones” which were actually chain link fences designed to corral protesters blocks away from the event they were protesting, I think they may have some choice words to say about it.

If you went on to let them know that the government had declared that it was now acceptable for them to spy on citizens by eavesdropping on and recording their conversations without notice, or that we have decided that it’s OK to invade and overthrow other countries who are not even threatening us much less attacking us, or that we make use of secret detention facilities in foreign lands, where we take prisoners without trial or even charge and hold them for years, and refuse to denounce the use of torture in said facilities, they would have some questions for you, in addition to their choice words. The first question would probably be “why aren’t you doing anything about it?”

May I see your denounciation blog postings of kosovo and waco?

We have been through this before and this will not be another long discussion on my part.

Iraq and the continued killing is the baathists, was sodamn insanes responsilbility and now others who are exploiting it such as sadr. They could all just go through the democratic process. Joe Liberman, leading dem. former pres. candidate ( shunned by the general network news ), stated that in general the Iraq people and society have improved greatly in the last year and they will self govern successfully.

But osamo/sadr/baathists et. al. pay people $ 150 to plant ied’s, it’s not about politics for most, and they pay more if you blow yourself up. al queda is using these dumb people as cannon fodder.

” nuke them all “, hardly going to happen.
But if as a white paper put out by one of these al queda nuts stated they will light off 7 nukes in 7 cities in america, there will be an awful Final backlash.

I am saddened by all of this death. I am not on bush’s or clinton’s side or the side of killing.

Tim Mcviegh, a noble American freedom fighting insurgent, or just another murderous thug, had an idea, is that what you want to do and think is right to rage against the empire this way?, to blow up some building killing more?

There is a double standard going on with the view of bush and clinton though, perpertrated by the STEADY Drumbeat of the BSN - BullShitNews network.

Clinton lied and killed many innocents in Kosovo to deflect the Monica affair to save his own personal ass from impeachment, but ‘” that was justified and a rescue mission against the horrible sadam “- say the liberals, oh I mean misloeivec ( however you spell his name )- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosovo_War#The_NATO_bombing_campaign

Not to mention the burning alive of American children Clinton IS responsilble for at Waco, 60 + people died, and other ” incidents ” with other groups.
If you are going to try bush you better make a seat next to him for clinton.
I didn’t hear or see the outrage in the news.

“… NASA does not follow the same rules when engaging in foreign intelligence gathering”

Did you hear through your JPL contacts that there actually is a space-based, super-secret spy satellite system monitoring our every move? I knew it!

To say that Bush was talking about some other type of wiretapping in this speech is just plain silly. It would require a lot of reading into what he said in order to infer that he meant “all wiretaps except these certain ones”. In fact, it’s even impossible to read that in, because he specifically states that he’s talking about wiretaps for “chasing down terrorists”. There is no possible confusion (or even loophole) here.

Sure, there are people debating whether in this particular case the wiretaps were illegal, but in everything I’ve read (and from the administration’s issued statements) their arguments hinge solely on the presumption that the authorization of “use of force” covers this activity, and overrides the specific rules of the FISA.

I say this is BS, and I think any clear-thinking, honest person would agree. Of course there are some with political motivations who will argue the point, as there always are, but to me that argument just does not hold water.

If the administration can broadly apply the authorization of “use of force” to such an unrelated activity, they could just as easily apply it to justifying things like torture or just walking up to someone on the street and shooting them in the head. Sure, it’s illegal, but “congress authorized the use of force”, so anything goes, eh?

Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires — a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so. It’s important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.

There is nothing unclear about this quote, or its context whatsoever.

As for me blowing it out of proportion, I beg to differ. To me, having a president that secretly authorizes illegal spying on American citizens is a huge deal.

And, if I remember correctly, so is the fact that he lied about it, in an attempt to hide / deny his actions.

The illegality of this wiretapping is clearly and explicitly defined in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. There is no denying this.

The assertion (by the administration and Alberto Gonzales) that the authorization by congress of the “use of force” shortly after 9/11 encompasses these actions is preposterous. Sorry, but you can’t make a huge generalization about a peripherally (at best) semi-related measure and use it to justify violating a carefully and explicitly stated law. If you’re going to paint with that broad of a brush, than *any* action the president chooses to take is therefore automatically justified, because he was “authorized to use force”.

In the end, even if you disagree on the legality of the wiretaps, it is undeniable based on that speech (in full context) that he knowingly lied about this issue.