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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (22766)	7/3/2006 4:10:15 PM
From: Dale Baker	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541382

Congress did not specifically exempt the wiretapping from the FISA legislation; Bush simply assumed the right under the authorization to go to war. The same may apply to the SWIFT program but I don't know the existing law on bank record snooping. I assume it also requires a warrant from someone, which Bush has simply disregarded under the exigencies of war. Maybe if Congress had passed something specifically saying "we don't want oversight here, let the President do whatever he likes" there might be a legal leg to stand on. All we have now is a very broad phrase which has been extended to mean all sorts of things. If I remember right, that is precisely what conservatives condemn the Supreme Court for doing. And the SC actually has the right to establish legal precedents. A particular set of occupants in the White House do not.