Point of No Return
Thomas Sowell explains what's at stake, as self-important senators decide how many angels can dance on the head of the "domestic wiretapping" pin. His point is well taken:
With Iran advancing step by step toward nuclear weapons, while the Europeans wring their hands and the United Nations engages in leisurely discussion, this squeamishness about tapping terrorists' phone contacts in the United States is grotesque.
With Iran advancing step by step toward nuclear weapons, while the Europeans wring their hands and the United Nations engages in leisurely discussion, this squeamishness about tapping terrorists' phone contacts in the United States is grotesque.
posted by LadybugUSA at 9:18 AM
7 Comments:
>>Legislators on both sides of the aisle are upset that US laws have been disregarded, either outright or through hypercritical and perhaps disingenuous legal interpretations by the Administration.>>
Legislators may think so, but that doesn't make it necessarily so. I don't think this point has actually been established.
>> It is proper and necessary for Congress to preserve its rights and prerogatives.>>
It is equally proper and necessary for the Executive Branch to preserve _its_ rights and prerogatives.
>>This story will not have legs because, at the end of the day, what the Administration has been doing is both reasonable and necessary in wartime, even if not supported by a reasonable or good-faith reading of the law. >>
Then doesn't it stand to reason that what the Administration has been doing _should_ be supported by a reasonable or good-faith reading of the law, even if it isn't?
>>The American people will expect the two branches of government to work out their difference on such an important matter and will punish posturing and politiking.>>
Agreed.
Thomas Sowell is brilliant. I've often had the feeling that as our government's bureacracy grows it becomes like a giant kidney stone that is going to be very painful to pass when the time comes for it to move. It has moved off track of what it should have been focused on during the 40+ years of Democratic control of Congress. I just hope the little David that takes it out will be on the side of freedom and reform and not sharia law.
While I agree with most everything Rzafft wrote above, it leaves open the basic questions.
Given that immediately after 9/11 Congress would have amended FISA as necessary, why oh why did the Bush administration decide instead to intentionally disregard the law?
Given Alberto Gonzales's explantion of the program yesterday, why did the Bush administration choose to violate FISA rather than getting the appropriate warrants?
President Bush has deliberately violated the laws of the United States and sought to provoke an unneccessary constitutional crisis. Why?
The "facts" and "laws" that Mr. Twister cites are currently in "dispute". Just like evolution is not fact. Just repeat it 3 times like Robert KKK Byrd, or Choose-a-Clinton and it will be true.
Mr. Twister is not paying attention. His feeble attempts to keep pushing the talking points of the left have been refuted time and again on this very blog. If the left would actually take the time and honestly look at the case law regarding this issue, they would see the President is acting completely within his constitutional rights and responsibilities.
My personal belief is that they already know this. They just want to try to score political points even if it is at the expense of national security.
The left is more than pathetic. They are dangerous.
Just in case you missed this from a previous thread, Mr. Twister. I'll re-post it here:
Mr. Twister,
You continue to assert that President Bush has viloated the laws of the land.
Would you care to cite a law that has been violated?
Can you cite a single case that has been decided by a single federal court that supports your claim?
On the other hand, if you were presented with cases in which the federal courts actually supported the actions President Bush has undertaken, would that change your mind?
Well said, Dan M.
Here's the way Natinal Review's Andy McCarthy put it:
"It is the President, not the Judiciary, which is supreme in matters of foreign intelligence collection and national security. It is, moreover, wartime. It is the President in our system who makes the ultimate judgment about what must be done to protect the public from foreign threats—even in peacetime. It would not be proper Constitutionally for the President to delegate that prerogative to another branch. Thus, if the FISA Court reviews the NSA program and opines against it, what is the President supposed to do? Discontinue a program that provides an early warning system against what could be a devastating attack? That is a call we elected him to make—the FISA court has no place making such judgments."
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