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Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (61319)	7/27/2007 3:41:16 PM
From: jlallen	Respond to of 90947

LOL!!

To: Sully- who wrote (61319)	7/27/2007 4:07:00 PM
From: Sully-	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 90947

BDS & the zeal to obtain power by any means necessary by the kleptocrats in the DNC is going to cost us big time. Ya, it's that bad. ** [Intelligence agencies] have to know that something bad might be going down before they can start listening in to see if something is being planned. That is the situation we're in now and the Democrats in Congress have been dragging their feet for purely political reasons about fixing it even though the Director of National Intelligence, Michael McConnell has been begging them to change the law.... [I]t shows once again why the decisions of unaccountable judges shouldn't be allowed to supplant those of an elected Commander in Chief. Politics and terrorist surveillance Betsy's Page Would you think that the U.S. government should have the power to listen in on phone calls between an Al Qaeda operative in Pakistan talking to another Al Qaeda guy in Afghanistan? Neither are U.S. citizens and they're not talking to each other on U.S. soil. Sounds like a no-brainer, doesn't it? But, unbelievably we have gotten into a situation where such terrorist surveillance requires the intelligence services to seek a warrant showing probable cause before they place the wiretap. In other words, they have to know that something bad might be going down before they can start listening in to see if something is being planned. That is the situation we're in now and the Democrats in Congress have been dragging their feet for purely political reasons about fixing it even though the Director of National Intelligence, Michael McConnell has been begging them to change the law. After all the fuss over a different program which let the government listen in on conversations between an Al Qaeda operative or sympathizer out of the country talking to someone within our country, the administration finally agreed this year to use the FISA courts to get warrants ahead of time. But this has also affected our abilities to listen in to the conversation of two suspected terrorists talking to eachother overseas. Let the Wall Street Journal explain what is going on. <<< This has turned out to be an enormous mistake that has unilaterally disarmed one of our best intelligence weapons in the war on terror.** To understand why, keep in mind that we live in a world of fiber optics and packet-switching. A wiretap today doesn't mean the FBI must install a bug on Abdul Terrorist's phone in Peshawar. Information now follows the path of least resistance, wherever that may lead. And because the U.S. has among the world's most efficient networks, hundreds of millions of foreign calls are routed through the U.S. That's right: If an al Qaeda operative in Quetta calls a fellow jihadi in Peshawar, that call may well travel through a U.S. network. This ought to be a big U.S. advantage in our "asymmetrical" conflict with terrorists. But it also means that, for the purposes of FISA, a foreign call that is routed through U.S. networks becomes a domestic call. So thanks to the obligation to abide by an outdated FISA statute, U.S. intelligence is now struggling even to tap the communications of foreign-based terrorists. If this makes you furious, it gets worse. Our understanding is that some FISA judges have been open to expediting warrants, as well as granting retroactive approval. But there are 11 judges in the FISA rotation, and some of them have been demanding that intelligence officials get permission in advance for wiretaps. This means missed opportunities and less effective intelligence. And it shows once again why the decisions of unaccountable judges shouldn't be allowed to supplant those of an elected Commander in Chief. When the program began, certain U.S. telecom companies also cooperated with the National Security Agency. But they were sued once the program was exposed, and so some have ceased cooperating for fear of damaging liability claims. We found all of this hard to believe when we first heard it, but we've since confirmed the details with other high-level sources. Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell more or less admitted the problem last week, albeit obliquely, when he told the Senate that "we're actually missing a significant portion of what we should be getting." That's understating things. Our sources say the surveillance program is now at most one-third as effective as it once was. >>> A law that was written in the 1970s just doesn't fit the technology of today where the U.S. might provide the hosting network and wiring through which such an overseas call might travel. And because of those outdated rules, a warrant is now necessary to listen in to those calls. Sounds like all we need is a simple change to the law. No Democrat could possibly want to put roadblocks in our way of surveilling foreign terrorists, right? Well, not exactly. <<< The Administration wants Congress to modernize FISA in two crucial ways: First, by allowing NSA to track on a real-time basis these foreign calls that may be routed through the U.S., and in some cases allowing warrants to be sought after the fact. Our spooks would still be accountable, but they'd also be able to act quickly to defend the country. Second, the White House is requesting liability protection for telecom companies that cooperate with the wiretap program. Neither of these changes should be at all controversial--and we're confident they'd have overwhelming public support if the issues were understood. Yet for six months Senate Democrats have resisted these legal changes to make Americans safer. Incredibly, they are fronting for their trial lawyer campaign donors in blocking liability protection. Their counteroffer is to have the federal government supplant the companies as the defendants in any wiretapping lawsuits, as if any such lawsuits were justified. Why are Democrats letting trial lawyers interfere with a vital intelligence operation? Meanwhile, Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy is holding any wiretap legislation hostage to his demand for Administration documents related to the program. This is part of the Democrats' political exercise to claim that Mr. Bush has somehow broken the law by allowing the wiretaps. Backed by grandstanding Republican Arlen Specter, in short, Mr. Leahy is more interested in fighting over how the program began than in allowing it to continue today. At least a few Democrats realize they may be setting themselves up for trouble if there's another terrorist attack. House Intelligence Chairman Silvestre Reyes wrote to Mr. Bush last week saying he was "very concerned" about the program and urging the Administration to "devote all the resources necessary to ensure that we are conducting maximum surveillance of the terrorist target abroad." >>> Does Congressman Reyes just want the administration to go ahead and do what they need to do to protect us while ignoring the FISA law? Isn't that what got them into trouble earlier with people all worried about the FISA courts being sidelined when listening in to terrorist calls involving someone in the U.S.? Does Reyes really want to be in the position of saying that he leaves it up to the administration to decide when to bypass the FISA law and when not to? Why not just make it easier and get together with the Senate Democrats and fix the dang law? The WSJ has their own solution if the Democrats continue to stall on this reform. <<< Six months is too long for Mr. Bush to cater to Pat Leahy while Americans are put at risk. The President should announce immediately that he is rescinding his concession to put these foreign wiretaps under the FISA court. He should say he is doing so as an urgent matter of national security as Commander in Chief because Congress has refused to respond in good faith by modernizing the law to let the U.S. eavesdrop on terrorists who wish us deadly harm. Then let Democrats explain why they're willing to put partisanship above the safety of America. >>> betsyspage.blogspot.com opinionjournal.com