OK, so the proposed situation is that Al Gore or John Kerry has decided to do wiretaps on people who are talking to Al-Qaeda operatives.
I would be absolutely fine with it.
First, I do believe quite firmly that this falls under prosecuting the war (see Soviet example below).
Second, I see no reason that the President should be considered guilty until proven innocent on this, and I would carry that over to President Gore or President Kerry if we were in that fix. Bush says that they went around the FISA court because of time issues. That is either the truth or a lie. Since the FISA court has been friendly to the administration and those spyed on are perfectly legitimate targets under FISA jurisdiction, I see no motivation other than the one stated to go around FISA. If you know of one, you can let me know.
Now that I've answered that, let me ask you a few questions:
1. Why are you holding the President guilty until proven innocent in this matter?
2. Where is your outrage against the punks who leaked this?
3. Where is your outrage against members of Congress who hae known about and helped approve this activity and are now acting shocked, shocked that this has been going on?
4. Why don't war powers cover this if the citizen is communicating with enemy personnel? We're not talking about somebody calling Tehran to talk to a mullah, we're talking about someone talking to an Al-Qaeda operative.
5. Here's a scenario and a question. It's the height of the Cold War, and the FBI suspects that ana American citizen living near Otis Air Force base in Massachusetts is a Soviet agent. They have evidence that he has been speaking to person in the Soviet Union whose expertise is the study of our air defense. The pattern of his calls suggests he may be advising them of activity during exercises at the base. Otis is responsible for guarding Air approaches to New York City, among other things. There is a major Soviet Naval Aviation exercise scheduled to begin in the next few hours and this guy has placed two or three calls to the Soviet analyst in just the last three hours, even though there is no activity going on at the base. The FBI agent looking at the case says, "I don't want to be alarmist, but this guy could be advising them of flight activity at the base so they can sneak some bombers through. This guy could be telling them the coast is clear, or he could be getting instructions for a sabotage mission of some sort."
Court approval will take to the end of the day at least. Do you tap the guy's phone or not?
Superb!
1. Why are you holding the President guilty until proven innocent in this matter?
-- I've just been reading the press like everyone else.
2. Where is your outrage against the punks who leaked this?
-- The NYT had meetings at the White House, and omitted items from the article that the White House. I think it's odd they didn't run it long ago. If you mean the "punks who leaked this" in the administration or Congress, I don't know who they are.
3. Where is your outrage against members of Congress who hae known about and helped approve this activity and are now acting shocked, shocked that this has been going on?
-- I think it's pretty spineless that one of them wrote a note saying "I don't like it" and left it at that; the ones who knew what was going on had plenty of opportunity to stand up and be counted, but politicians in general are not particularly good at courage, I've noticed.
4. Why don't war powers cover this if the citizen is communicating with enemy personnel? We're not talking about somebody calling Tehran to talk to a mullah, we're talking about someone talking to an Al-Qaeda operative.
-- I don't know. I had no hand in writing the legislation.
5. Here's a scenario and a question. It's the height of the Cold War, and the FBI suspects that ana American citizen living near Otis Air Force base in Massachusetts is a Soviet agent. They have evidence that he has been speaking to person in the Soviet Union whose expertise is the study of our air defense. The pattern of his calls suggests he may be advising them of activity during exercises at the base. Otis is responsible for guarding Air approaches to New York City, among other things. There is a major Soviet Naval Aviation exercise scheduled to begin in the next few hours and this guy has placed two or three calls to the Soviet analyst in just the last three hours, even though there is no activity going on at the base. The FBI agent looking at the case says, "I don't want to be alarmist, but this guy could be advising them of flight activity at the base so they can sneak some bombers through. This guy could be telling them the coast is clear, or he could be getting instructions for a sabotage mission of some sort."
Court approval will take to the end of the day at least. Do you tap the guy's phone or not?
--- Depends. What color tie is he wearing? Geez, talk about a convoluted example. I'm sure it happens and I don't know what I would do. I hope that in any public office I would follow the Constitution and the law, since that is what I would be sworn to do.