The Left is beside itself (its best company, after all, is itself) with glee that the president might have finally stepped in it.
This may reflect wishful thinking, if it is thinking at all, since I suspect that most people will not be so agitated over interceptions of communications between individuals overseas with terrorist ties and people in the United States. Nor is the law as clear in this area, at least as regards the president’s constitutional authority, as the delirious accusers assume.
But never mind. Here is former Democratic operative and current progressive activist David Sirota, writing here on HuffingtonPost, after quoting from the president’s recent press conference:
This is a form of lying that is worse than even the day-to-day lying that goes on in politics. This is premeditated lying — lying where everyone in the room knows a calculated lie is being told; lying where the facts invoked in the very question asked is patently ignored. How could he possibly cite the need for speed as the reason for refusing to get search warrants, when those warrants can be issued retroactively, and thus do not slow down operations in any way at all?
There really is only one explanation that a sane, rational person could come up with: The surveillance operations Bush is ordering are so outrageous, so unrelated to the War on Terror and such an unconstitutional breach of authority that he knows that even a court that has rejected just 4 warrant requests in 25 years will reject what he’s doing.
….
This scandal has quickly ripped the veneer off this White House’s use of “national security” in the post-9/11 world. It sees “national security” not as a priority in defending America, but as a slogan that justifies smarmy, used-to-getting-whatever-they-want politicians trampling the laws that are supposed to confine state power. This has nothing to do with the need for speed, or the need to fight terrorists — it has everything to do with an out-of-control, paranoid President believing he is above the laws that have governed this country for 200 years. And if America lets this stand — if we let the law be “brushed aside” — we set a dangerous precedent for future presidents to trample our Constitution.
Actually, Sirota toned down and cleaned up his act, presumably out of respect for Ms. Huffington’s sensibilities. Here he is on his own blog, in a post he titles “Kissing the Fat White Ass of Power“:
Today, as the Bush administration cites laziness as the grounds for its illegal domestic spying operation, we finally see how the people who run our government really view the rule of law with utter contempt. And, perhaps even more sad is the media/punditry’s mob-like stampede not to challenge what we’re being told, but to kiss the fat white ass of power even as it farts the most foul-smelling lies right in America’s face.
Less scatological but no less intemperate was an OpEd written, or at least signed, by Sen. Kennedy:
THE PRESIDENT is not above the law; he is not King George. Yet, with sorrow, we are now learning that in this great land we have an administration that has refused to follow well-crafted, longstanding procedures that require the president to get a court order before spying on people within the United States. With outrage, we learn that this administration believes that it does not have to follow the law of the land.
Not just above the law, this administration seems to be saying that it IS the law. It contends that it can decide on its own what the law is, how to interpret it, and whether or not it has to follow it. I believe that such an arrogant and expansive view of executive power would have sent chills down the spines of our Founding Fathers — as it does for every American hearing these startling revelations today.
Well, not every American. I assume Adam Liptak of the New York Times is an American, and he has just written that
[t]he Supreme Court has never addressed the question of whether the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, is violated by electronic surveillance of people in the United States of the sort that President Bush authorized after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
….
In 1972, the court ruled that a judge’s permission was required to satisfy the Fourth Amendment in cases involving domestic intelligence surveillance. But there, too, the court put off an important question. for another day. Its ruling, Justice Lewis Powell Jr. wrote, “requires no judgment on the scope of the president’s surveillance power with respect to the activities of foreign powers, within or without this country.”
Lower courts since then have given mixed answers to the question of whether the president has the power to spy on Americans in connection with their international contacts. In 2002, the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review seemed to accept the administration’s argument that the president has “inherent constitutional authority to conduct warrantless foreign intelligence surveillance.”
I’m not sure what the law in this area actually is (much less what it should be), and I doubt that Sen. Kennedy knows either. But no matter. We don’t have to be familiar with actual Supreme Court opinions in this area. When you get right down to it, people like David Sirota, and perhaps Sen. Kennedy, probably don’t regard Justice Powell, other Supreme Court justices, or even New York Times reporters, when they question leftist certainties, as “sane, rational” people.
UPDATE
Anyone who thinks, with David Sirota et. al., that no “sane, rational” person can regard President Bush as anything other than a constitution-destroying, consciously lying lawbreaker hasn’t read Orin Kerr’s remarkable fair and balanced post on the legality of the surveillance programs and the 297 (and still appearing) comments on it.
Meanwhile, legal defenses of the president’s behavior continue to surface. The Department of Justice has sent a letter arguing that the policy is constitutional and is not in violation of FISA. In addition, a deputy attorney general has testified that
[t]he Department of Justice believes — and the case law supports — that the president has inherent authority to conduct warrantless physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes and that the president may, as he has done, delegate this authority to the attorney general
— and that the same authority also applies to electronic surveillance.
Oh, wait. That testimony was by Jamie Gorelick, in 1994, when she was Deputy Attorney General in the Clinton administration.
UPDATE II [23 Dec.]
In his Washington Post column today, “Impeachment Nonsense,” Charles Krauthammer observes:
Presidents always jealously guard executive authority. And Congress always wants to challenge the scope of that authority. This tug of war is a bipartisan and constant feature of the American system of separation of powers. President Bush’s circumvention of FISA is a classic separation-of-powers dispute in the area in which these powers are most in dispute — war powers.
Consider the War Powers Resolution passed over Richard Nixon’s veto in 1973. It restricts, with very specific timetables, the president’s authority to use force. Every president since Nixon, Democrat and Republican, has regarded himself not bound by this law, declaring it an unconstitutional invasion of his authority as commander in chief.
The administration’s argument that the Authorization to Use Military Force in Iraq also of necessity authorized the gathering of necessary intelligence has been widely criticized (including by former Sen. Tom Daschle, also in today’s WaPo), but Krauthammer, though he himself is skeptical of that argument, finds support for it from a surprising source, liberal Univ. of Chicago law prof (and Democratic advisor) Cass Sunstein, who
finds it “entirely plausible” (so long as the wiretapping is limited to those reasonably believed to be associated with al Qaeda). Sunstein maintains that “surveillance, including wiretapping, is reasonably believed to be an incident of the use of force” that “standardly occurs during war.”
Krauthammer also quotes, among others, John Schmidt, an associate attorney general:
Every president since FISA’s passage has asserted that he retained inherent power to go beyond the act’s terms.
Oh, I forgot to mention that John Schmidt was associate attorney general in the Clinton administration.
UPDATE III [24 Dec.]
See this post on PowerLine for a powerful argument for the legality of the intercept program.
I suspect that most Americans not only think the administrations actions were alright, but also that we EXPECT the government to monitor suspect international communications.
And W’s poll #s are up to 50%.
I wonder what will happen when people open their YE 401K statements?
Ohh, and we’re monitoring muslim homes for radiation.
I can live w/that.
Sandy writes:
>>>”And W’s poll #s are up to 50%.”
Where are those polls? I’d love to see your documentation on this.
Second, civil liberties are not an exclusively “left wing” issue.
>>>”BOB BARR, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: What’s wrong with it is several-fold. One, it’s bad policy for our government to be spying on American citizens through the National Security Agency. Secondly, it’s bad to be spying on Americans without court oversight. And thirdly, it’s bad to be spying on Americans apparently in violation of federal laws against doing it without court order…”
Right Wingers against spying
If you believe that the President is above the law, then you should openly claim so. I didn’t hear that kind of discussion eight years ago, however.
–Cobra
Its good to see the usual suspects tell us about the Left’s love of civil liberties. I mean who can forget the 1,000 FBI files that Clinton used to expand civil libberties? Or the use of military assets to surveil the compound in Waco for the crime of practising religion? I am also ashamed to admit as a non Leftist that I didn’t understand the civil liberty aspects that Left was protecting when they burned women and children to death for again practising their religious beliefs. I’m assured by the same Leftist experts who have boldly aserted the President should be impeached for his activities that there is no provision for religious freedom in the Constitution just a sepeartion between church and state.
But I loved the way the Left protected our civil liberties by shooting a woman armed with a deadly baby at Ruby Ridge. I mean wasn’t that the Left that told us Tookie should be spared? Apparently the value system of the Left differs somewhat from my universe.
What is more the amazing is the same old toadies telling us how shameful Bush’s actions were were briefed on the program numerous times and never objected. Perhaps we need an age restrictions on Leftist trolls since they go senile so quickly.
Anyone who wondered how France collapsed so quickly or how Europe could have so many Quislings in the wings waiting for the victory of the worst speciies of humanity can rest comfortably in the knowledge that the USA has many of their ilk just waiting for the forces of darkness.
I am not entirely sure, but I think Ruby Ridge happened during President George HW Bush.
The idea that intercepted communication between avowed enemies of this country and Americans are somehow off limits unless there is a warrent is just nuts. I doubt if we are just talking phone calls either. I would imagine email, IM, chat rooms etc are in this.
Though I’ve visited (and probably commented at) this weblog before, I just came here via a link at the Washington Post page with Charles Krauthammer’s article. It’s interesting that that newspaper now lists, on its online articles, links to blogs that reference those pieces. Have you received many hits from the WaPo’s website, due to this?
As for the Krauthammer article, I am impressed by it’s balance; I think that it is a fair analysis. The Democrats are trying to use this for political gain, when in reality, similar things (actually, more serious infractions) were committed by their own party’s past presidents, such as FDR and Clinton. That does not make those actions – or the Bush administration’s actions – correct, but it does exemplify the hypocrisy that they are exhibiting.
aakash – Thanks for your comment, which was my first clue about the WaPo link, which in turn suggests that I haven’t had many hits from it (yet?). I do think linking blog posts about newspaper articles is a good and clever thing for papers to do.
cobra – Amazing! You’ve actually said something with which I really have no quarrel. If you will recall everything I’ve said about this spying flap, you’ll note that I never said it was good “policy.” Indeed, I think it would have been more politic to involve the Congress even more than was done (though note that Senators, including Democrats, were briefed) and even to get the FISA law changed.
That it may have been bad policy, however, does not mean that it was either illegal or unconstitutional.
John,
We can occassionally be on the same side of an issue, you know. These aren’t cut and paste, black and white topics we discuss here. They have real reprecussions and implications in people’s lives.
I’m glad that you can acknowledge that there is a problem worthy of further investigation and examination than the–“Bush is my Republican King and can do anything he darn well pleases” types that comment on this thread.
Speaking of which:
TJ writes:
>>>”I mean who can forget the 1,000 FBI files that Clinton used to expand civil libberties? Or the use of military assets to surveil the compound in Waco for the crime of practising religion?”
First of all, there was an investigation into the “Filegate” issue. The results?
>>>” The final report on the so-called “filegate” scandal was unsealed Friday by a federal appeals court, and Whitewater Independent Counsel Robert Ray said the report shows no evidence of misconduct by first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton or former White House Counsel Bernard Nussbaum.”
Filegate–Nothing there
As far as “surveiling a compound of religeous believers”–
>>>According to financial records Koresh spent $199,715.00 on weapons and ammunition in the 17 months immediately proceeding the BATF raid on his compound.
The remnants of a huge arsenal was later found after the fire amidst the ruins of the Davidian compound. This stockpile included grenades, gas masks, more than a million rounds of ammunition and at least 40 submachine guns.
Amongst the more than 200 weapons catalogued were:
19 SGW CAR-AR assault submachine guns (three fitted with silencers), nine other silencers
8 hand grenades and at least 31 other grenade parts and fragments, more than 20 pieces and fragments of rockets (apparently used to make rocket-propelled grenades) along with 1 sight for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.
3 Israeli-made IMI Galil assault rifles
10 Ruger Mini-14 assault rifles (one with a mounted scope)
A barrel for a M60 machine gun
1 30 mm rocket shell
9 FAL assault rifles (three mounted on bipods)
At least 54 AK-47 or AKS assault rifles (some converted to fully automatic submachine guns)
11 .12-gauge shotguns (one with a sawed-off barrel)
Dozens of pistols
Dozens of barrels for M-16s, AR-15s and other weapons
Gas masks and one chemical warfare suit
Several Kevlar tactical vests and other body armor and eight Kevlar helmets.
Also found were lathes, milling equipment and other tooling machinery, which essentially substantiated the suspicions of authorities, who believed that Koresh and the Davidians were engaged in the illegal conversion of assault rifles to automatic weapons and the manufacture of crude “grease guns.”
http://www.culteducation.com/waco.html
Now, if you believe that Dave Koresh, a psycopathic pedophile cult-leader who thought he was Jesus Christ, who responded to a warrant by killing 4 federal agents and wounded 16 others is somehow ABOVE “surveilance” because he was “practicing religion”, what possible excuse would you have for surveiling muslims in America, the vast majority of which, have committed no crimes? Do you see the hypocrisy here?
And I’m still waiting for the “more serious” infractions committed by Clinton, because if you believe for a SECOND that the right winged congress wouldn’t have used it against him during the 90’s, you’re crazy.
–Cobra
Cobra,
Just out of curiosity, do you have any theory as to how those files got to the White House if no one asked for them? I have never understood why the next question after “Was it Hillary? Was it Bernie?” wasn’t “Then who was it?” This is not material that ought to be getting out of the FBI’s possession without the tightest controls on it.
Cobra: You are funny.
We are supposed to believe a government report regrding weapons when the government demolished the buildings the day after the event? As for the weapons supposedly seized anyone who watched the hearings realized the weapons weren’t displayed for months following the attack. Why was that?
Its rather odd I am unaware of the crime committed by owning weapons. Perhaps you can cite the relevant crime? Again anyone watching or reading the testimony is struck by the contradictions that emerged and the complete lack of evidence for either the raid or the attack.
We do know that Clinton illegally used military assets to fly recon missions over Waco and used the military for interception of telephone messages. The question is why?
After all the nonsense is done with Bush’s crimes we are left with the 80 odd dead Americans killed on Clinton’s orders for what crime? Where were the judges orders; where was the rule of law? But this is the typical Leftist use of law for its own ends.
It is worth noting that the government also denied using incendiary devices though the gas used clearly stated that it was highly inflamable when used in confined spaces, so the FBI and the military who advised them knew what they were doing.
The complete trampling of the law under the Democrats and Clinton will be further revealed as the Able Danger matters are cleared. It is my opinion the desperate attanmpts to bury this is to protect the Gorlicks and Clinton’s from their actions during their corrupt years in power.
I do so love reading Cobra’s comments, they remind one excatly how badly the education system in this country has failed when we see such “facts” served up in such a witless manner to enable further charades of the dark side of the Left.
TJackson,
Perhaps your insults would have a little more validity if you were polite enough to provide sources for your claims.
Even one?
C’mon. Surely you can do better than this.
Michelle writes:
>>>”Just out of curiosity, do you have any theory as to how those files got to the White House if no one asked for them?”
To be honest, I don’t know. I really don’t. Could there have been shenanigans going on? Maybe, maybe not. But if nothing was found after the vicious anti-Clinton crusades of the late nineties, then I’d tend to believe the latter.
–Cobra