Our own Cortexan and current Daily Kos front pager, Georgia10, did an excellent job summing up the legal arguments against Bush's warrantless spying in this article.  

The law does not permit warrantless surveillance searches without probable cause.   The Supreme Court has held that police frisks and other more limited forms of searches could be held to a "reasonable suspicion" standard. But as to the pervasive, highly intrusive search that occurs when the government wiretaps or intercepts the communications of its citizens, a probable cause standard is constitutionally required.

 For anyone having to go up against the forces of right wing talking points and just general media misinformation, it's a must read.

But there's significance to Bush's action that goes beyond the president's ability to conduct searches, or the limits of wartime power.  It's just as import to look at how the Bush administration has conducted themselves in this affair as the specifics of what they've done.  

After careful consideration, I think that I would like to have my own personal NSA agent. One who can always be within ear-shot of every word that I say, within eyesight of every blog I write, and every web page that I visit. He could document my every move for the War on Civil Liberties. At least then I would know that I was being spied on.

There is an interesting article in the San Jose Mercury news this morning about Stanford Professor Larry Diamond, who is one of the plaintiffs in the ACLU Lawsuit against Bush for the illegal, warrantless NSA wiretapping.  It is worth reading, but I wanted to excerpt a few paragraphs, because Diamond states his position quite eloquently, I think:

Every day on the Stanford University campus, Larry Diamond teaches his students that the president of the United States is not above the law.

Which is why Diamond decided to sue President Bush when he learned that the president had authorized spying on Americans without consent of Congress or the courts. Diamond believes he is among the targets of surveillance.

"I'm disturbed,'' said Diamond, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution [sic!] who has studied and taught democracy for more than 30 years. He is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit filed Tuesday by the American Civil Liberties Union suit against Bush, the National Security Agency and the heads of other major agencies. "I'm not afraid. I don't feel that I'm in danger. I don't expect retribution.''

[More below the flip]

I'm not one to sieze on another's thunder, so I want to say I first saw the story here.

Bottom line: Bush has lied again. And this lie is as bad as he justifications for going into Iraq (or anything else he's done, for that matter).

i've posted previously on echelon, here and here... the description of nsa spying activities, provided by tice, the recently-identified nsa whistleblower, fits echelon to a "t..."

   Russell Tice, a longtime insider at the National Security Agency, is now a whistleblower the agency would like to keep quiet.

    [...]

    Tice tells ABC News that some of those secret "black world" operations run by the NSA were operated in ways that he believes violated the law.

    [...]

Visitors to the NSA's website may have received more than just information about the agency.  It seems that computer files or cookies  were being placed on visitor's computers.  Cookies are used to track web surfing.  Such placement is illegal.

(I posted this at my blog and Daily Kos and figured I should shoot it over here, too!!)

Certainly the Bush administration is in a pickle over the recent revelation that Bush himself, in 2002, authorized the National Security Agency (NSA) to conduct electronic surveillance against US citizens.  Presumably, and I'm paraphrasing the President himself with this, it was only to listen to bad guys talking to bad guys.  According to Bush, this action was not only legal but required in his solemn duty to protect America and its citizens.

I think it's worthwhile to take a closer look at FISA itself, inform ourselves, and be prepared for the arguments the administration is going to make as to why these secret, warrantless surveillance activities are not, as the President asserts, illegal.  In fact, his argument is that they are proper.

Read on.

Ann Coulter's latest column implies that a legally-conducted New York Times investigation is equivalent to the illegal spying conducted by Bush, libels Frank Rich, advocates the use of torture and genocide, and makes racist statements about Arabs and Asians:

...I have difficulty ginning up much interest in [Bush's criminal activities] inasmuch as I think the government should be spying on all Arabs, engaging in torture as a televised spectator sport, dropping daisy cutters wantonly throughout the Middle East...

There are no Japanese internment camps today. (Although the no-limit blackjack section at Caesar's Palace on a Saturday night comes pretty close.)

Someone needs to tell Coulter that Israel is in the Middle East... unless she wants Israel hit by daisy cutters, in which case we can add anti-Semitism to her ever-growing list of abhorrent character flaws.

All in all, business as usual for the immoral, intellectually bankrupt, treasonous elitist. Let's hope the next pie that hits her in the face contains anthrax.

Just last Saturday, a snarling Bush gave a live address to say that he had indeed been going after domestic calls without a warrant, that he was going to keep doing it, and that Alberto said it was part of his powers so what are you gonna do about it?   Besides, Bush said that it was only affecting a few people.  You know, the bad guys.

Now it seems that the real scope of the spying was much larger than was admitted when Bush fessed up a week ago.

The NSA, with help from American telecommunications companies, obtained access to streams of domestic and international communications, said the Times in the report late Friday, citing unidentified current and former government officials.

Bush has not only confirmed his use of domestic spying without a warrant, but vowed that he will continue, despite deep concerns from legal scholars, senators, and anyone who has a lick of sense.

For those on the far right, the real danger is those traitors at the New York Times and the leakers who actually revealed what our glorious leader was up to, or something like that.  Bush is leading the chorus.  

"My personal opinion is it was a shameful act, for someone to disclose this very important program in time of war," the president said. "The fact that we're discussing this program is helping the enemy."

Is it?  Is it helping "the enemy," Mr. President?  Because, you know, the enemy already knew that the NSA could monitor overseas calls.  Heck, that's part of the agency's charter.  So what, exactly, is it that the reports have revealed?

Why, Mr. President, did you break the law?

Cross posted on Daily Kos, My Left Wing, Booman Tribune

Sun Dec 18, 2005 at 08:25:30 AM PDT
My door is wide open. I'm waiting. I'm ready and I'm not scared.

I call Europe all the time. I email Europe all the time. I guess this might make me an enemy of the state.

I'm only scared of a few things. I'm scared that still the American people seem brain dead.

I'm scared that still plenty of Americans think George Bush is a good president.

I'm scared that still the Democrats are making nice with a tyrant.

If you missed the Bush radio address this morning, you missed a vapid defense of the Patriot Act, complete with the usual vague, detail-free justifications. But you know the really weird thing?  Bush missed the address, too.  Because instead of delivering the scheduled radio address, he made a TV appearance to deliver a much more pointed message.

Bush's points this morning:

1. Senators who block the Patriot Act are helping terrorists.

2. Yes, I did authorize spying on Americans without a warrant.

3. I'm going to do it again whenever I want.

4. Open democracy be damned.