Bush worshippers don't want to hear the truth repeated

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Bush�s Snoopgate
The president was so desperate to kill The New York Times� eavesdropping story, he summoned the paper�s editor and publisher to the Oval Office. But it wasn�t just out of concern about national security.

Dec. 19, 2005 - Finally we have a Washington scandal that goes beyond sex, corruption and political intrigue to big issues like security versus liberty and the reasonable bounds of presidential power. President Bush came out swinging on Snoopgate�he made it seem as if those who didn�t agree with him wanted to leave us vulnerable to Al Qaeda�but it will not work. We�re seeing clearly now that Bush thought 9/11 gave him license to act like a dictator, or in his own mind, no doubt, like Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War.

No wonder Bush was so desperate that The New York Times not publish its story on the National Security Agency eavesdropping on American citizens without a warrant, in what lawyers outside the administration say is a clear violation of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. I learned this week that on December 6, Bush summoned Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger and executive editor Bill Keller to the Oval Office in a futile attempt to talk them out of running the story. The Times will not comment on the meeting,
but one can only imagine the president�s desperation.

The problem was not that the disclosures would compromise national security, as Bush claimed at his press conference. His comparison to the damaging pre-9/11 revelation of Osama bin Laden�s use of a satellite phone, which caused bin Laden to change tactics, is fallacious; any Americans with ties to Muslim extremists�in fact, all American Muslims, period�have long since suspected that the U.S. government might be listening in to their conversations. Bush claimed that �the fact that we are discussing this program is helping the enemy.� But there is simply no evidence, or even reasonable presumption, that this is so. And rather than the leaking being a �shameful act,� it was the work of a patriot inside the government who was trying to stop a presidential power grab.

No, Bush was desperate to keep the Times from running this important story�which the paper had already inexplicably held for a year�because he knew that it would reveal him as a law-breaker. He insists he had �legal authority derived from the Constitution and congressional resolution authorizing force.� But the Constitution explicitly requires the president to obey the law. And the post 9/11 congressional resolution authorizing �all necessary force� in fighting terrorism was made in clear reference to military intervention. It did not scrap the Constitution and allow the president to do whatever he pleased in any area in the name of fighting terrorism.

What is especially perplexing about this story is that the 1978 law set up a special court to approve eavesdropping in hours, even minutes, if necessary. In fact, the law allows the government to eavesdrop on its own, then retroactively justify it to the court, essentially obtaining a warrant after the fact. Since 1979, the FISA court has approved tens of thousands of eavesdropping requests and rejected only four. There was no indication the existing system was slow�as the president seemed to claim in his press conference�or in any way required extra-constitutional action.

This will all play out eventually in congressional committees and in the United States Supreme Court. If the Democrats regain control of Congress, there may even be articles of impeachment introduced. Similar abuse of power was part of the impeachment charge brought against Richard Nixon in 1974.

In the meantime, it is unlikely that Bush will echo President Kennedy in 1961. After JFK managed to tone down a New York Times story by Tad Szulc on the Bay of Pigs invasion, he confided to Times editor Turner Catledge that he wished the paper had printed the whole story because it might have spared him such a stunning defeat in Cuba.

This time, the president knew publication would cause him great embarrassment and trouble for the rest of his presidency. It was for that reason�and less out of genuine concern about national security�that George W. Bush tried so hard to kill the New York Times story.

put to rest. Regarding the "liberal" media and its slant in favor of liberal thinking. Tonight on 20/20 (ABC - one of the big 3) had a story by that highly regarded, unbiased John Stossel. The subject was "scientists who disagree with the global warming theory and the threats on their lives!!" It was mentioned it twice -- they actually been threatened with DEATH for disagreeing. I watched. It was 6 assorted scientists who claimed that global warming might not be caused by mankind, and even if it were, it might not be all bad. The horrific death threats -- are you ready? An e-mail stating "you might not even be alive when the planet warms up." Sends a shiver up your spine, doesn't it? Bill O'Reilly himself couldn't have made a bigger mountain out of that molehill.

for the rich -- and "rich," by the way, is anyone earning more than a quarter of a million dollars a year.

Obama wants to give tax CREDITS to businesses that keep jobs in the USA, instead of exporting them out of the country.

These huge greedy corporations may be creating jobs, but they're not creating American jobs. Obama wants to try to slow that down and wants to reward companies who don't turn their backs on Americans.

...that you're terribly proud of youself because when you beat up on people and they bite back at you that you don't whine about it? And also that you beat up on the libs because of their feelings about the troops and the war. Seems like you lash out indiscriminately on this board without really knowing what most folks believe.

And you are deceitful in saying I saw someone on the conservative board being wished to die and burn in hell once. ACtually I wrote the post you refer to and that is NOT what I wrote. Do you recall the game folks play at parties where a story is whispered in the ear of one person after another and then the story is read as it started out and then read as it ended up? And then everyone marvels over how much it changed? Well, that's what has happened here. So you are lying when you provide a quote of that post as the truth.

Reading your post, I think you'd be shocked if you realized how close you came to describing MY life!

The unique thing about conservatives is that they form their own opinions. Savage came out against Palin, and yesterday he was still against her. I don't need anyone to decide or think for me. But his stories are so worth the time. This is one area where he's completely different from all of them. That's why he wrote this current book and did every bit of it himself. No editing, no publisher, just his words. Gotta respect that, I say. His dog (Teddy) has become a big star, too, and has his own section on his w/s.