The same people who blast President Bush for covert domestic-surveillance programs blasted him after 9/11 for his lack of covert domestic-surveillance programs. The "Bush spying on Americans" mantra doesn't do anything for me. It's a slogan. What Americans are the Bush Administration spying on? For what reason? I'd feel a whole lot better if my government had spied on these Americans. In other words, there is nothing inherently wrong with the American government spying on certain Americans, and in some cases, there is something very proper about the American government spying on certain Americans. If the government prying is "unreasonable" or not based on "probable cause," then the Bush Administration likely has done something unconstitutional (Newsflash: it won't, unfortunately, be the first time). Prosecute. This gives the Bush Administration a potential legal problem. But the harping gives the Democratic Party a real political problem. The latter is more serious, politically speaking, than the former. When the next terrorist strike hits, who wants to be the guy who made it harder for intelligence agencies to prevent it?

It looks bad legally for the President seeing as how John Ashcroft and James Comey didn't want to sign off on the program.

However, the liberals I observe on blogs have gone completely nutty. They have overnight become the most strict constructionists ever. Living constitution what? Bending to suite the times eh?

I keep hearing it be insisted by liberals that we aren't at war (mainly because Congress only authorized it, and didn't declare it). And usually they blather something about Iraq. Never does the small issue of 9/11 enter the discussion.

Anyone else getting tired of Ben Franklin's "liberty for security" quote being bandied about? Too bad liberals can't think of any other situations where the quote might be applicable, say Social Security?

A big reason that our government needs to be able to monitor or “spy”, if you will, on certain members of our population in the first place was the lack of intelligence and inter-agency cooperation that led to 3,000 killed and the demolition of lower Manhattan not too long ago.

If some civil liberties have to be slightly bent or if some in our society need to be inconvenienced so that we will be safer on the whole, then so be it.

This is a war and I support Bush in this. We have to make this country stronger and more internally secure. Ultimately, he’s doing what he thinks needs to be done to protect the people he serves and the only people who should be worried about this are ones who have something to hide or are in line with committing the kinds of crimes that this is designed to prevent. Or, of course, the ones who are looking to build political capital on the failure of this administration.

Excellent, Dan, and I agree wholeheartedly. In addition to your rather witty inclusion of links to Americans who should have been spied on, but weren't, I'd include the 300 or so Soviet agents who assumed sensitive positions in the State Department, the Pentagon, the White House and the Manhattan Project before, during and after WWII and whose spying wasn't ultimately confirmed until our government finally saw fit to tell us about with the declassification of the Venon Project in 1995. This revelation, I might add, has been either completely ignored or deconstructed by the media during the decade since Venona became a matter of public record. Even among those academics who have been foremost in publishing the results of Venona (Harvey Klehr and John Earl Haynes), there is a dispassionate lack of concern, urgency and outrage over the fact that not only our national government, but the Democratic Party was infiltrated by communist agents bent on subverting America. Of course, since it's been fifty years and the subversion has long ago been carried out (with the aid of the ACLU, a communist front organization), what should we expect? As in the movie "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," who is left to care about it after the country's already been taken over?

Gary, you seem to have read up on Venona quite a bit. Any idea if there is any effort underway to crack the intercepts that we couldn't crack at the time? I seem to recall we only had a success rate of 50%. It would seem then that Soviet infiltration could have been even double what we assume from available intercepts.

You are right that it is shameful how little mention Venona gets, especially when lefties in Hollywood like Clooney keep trotting out the McCarthyism canard.

Obi Juan: I believe our success rate in translating intercepted Venona cables is closer to 2-3%. In other words, the government intercepted 100,000 or so transmissions but only figured out what 2,000-3,000 actually said.

A good answer to this post can be extensively definitively researched at, www.supportthetruth.co

*extensively AND definitively. Me deepest apologies for the grammatical mistakes.

Obi juan, I think Dan's answer is probably more acurate. All the more to worry about, then.

Bushco, the URL you provided doesn't seem to exist.

.com

Ah, I see. Thanks....I think. Looks like leftist propaganda to me. Unless you're trying to incite a riot here, I think this crap would play better on a leftwing site.

Dan, as to the last line, preventing Intelligence agencies from talking to each other hasn't hurt Jamie Gorelic. Did I spell that right?

Hey Gary, why don't you take some time out and actually watch some of those videos and decide for yourself; rather than impulsively call it propaganda? Think

Dan: Probable cause is not necessary for constitutionality in this case. This spying is empowered under the president's Article II power to conduct the nation's war effort, when war was declared on al Qaeda three days after 9/11. There might be a STATUTORY violation under the NISA act, but that would be trumped by the Constitution. Congress has no power to limit the president's Article II powers. The same thing with torture. Congress can ban torture all it wants, but if the president decides he needs to torture some bomb-planter to effectively prosecute the war, his constitutional powers trump any legislation.

Alec: You say "Probable cause is not necessary for constitutionality in this case," but "probable cause" is part of the Constitution. When we are talking about American citizens, "probable cause" matters. You can't imagine it out of the Constitution. It's there.

"Hey Gary, why don't you take some time out and actually watch some of those videos and decide for yourself; rather than impulsively call it propaganda? Think"

Actually, after watching for a few seconds and scrolling down the page to what else was there, I did think. I thought the whole site was a moronic display of leftist garbage, so I left.

Dear asdf, giving up ones civil rights does not lead to liberty, but can only lead to tyranny. Oh yeah, it is clear that you have taken the 911 hook, line and sinker all the way. Give it up boss, look around and see the bigger picture. This pathetic administraion will ride the 911 wave as long as fools like you continue to surf upon it. www.supportthetruth.c o m

Seriously asdf, please do your research.

The only ones who I see as a threat to my civil liberties is the ACLU. If there ever was a misnomer, there it is. But I'm sure you're in lockstep with these guys YKW.

I am not that paranoid where I think that Bush and other members of our government are interested in spying on law abiding citizens. In fact, I'm still more that willing to allow my government to bend to rules a bit to protect me.

Face it YKW, you are just another knee jerk liberal.

Funny that when the Clintons were using the IRS to intimidate and financially spy on their enemies, people of your ilk were typically silent.