Replies

This is fully compliant with the Constitution, which does not protect "privacy" for people who are having conversations with enemies of the United States.

Everyone but the left seems to understand this. I've never seen a bigger group of people who are so sensitive to the rights of the jihadists and America's enemies. They have tried to tie the president's hands on nearly every single tool at his disposal. And they are the same people who will scream the loudest when there's another attack.

Because communications intelligence activities constitute, to use the language of Hamdi, a fundamental incident of waging war, the AUMF clearly und unmistakably authorizes such activities directed against the communications of our enemy.

Check and mate! Moonbats will be very disappointed.

"Everyone but the left seems to understand this. I've never seen a bigger group of people who are so sensitive to the rights of the jihadists and America's enemies."

This is because many of these liberals are also enemies of the United States, in that they are working to change the traditional way we live and govern ourselves. So what you have before you are different enemies joining forces for a common goal, the destruction of America as we know it.

The Leftists, in their blind drive for power, probably do not understand that even a mighty nation like the U.S. can eventually be brought down or heavily damaged by an enemy like al Quaida if we don't fight back with vigor. Hence, what they hope to see is the islamofascists do just enough damage to our country that a power shift will occur within, to their favor of course.

No, Peach, I understand that full well. And I'm not protecting jihadists. What you fail to acknowledge is what even the government has acknowledged: Not everyone who has been subjected to a warrantless wiretap is having conversations with enemies of the United States. The NSA has even secretly surveilled some folks, decided they weren't interested, and dropped it. They have wiretapped purely domestic communications, which they contend were accidental. The system as constituted does not only listen to those who are 'agents of a foreign power.' It listens to those who someone thinks might be, without any review of the basis of that determination to see whether it is valid.

It is not only moonbats who recognize the legal problems with the programs. Bob Barr has stated that the program is obviously in violation of the law. Richard Posner has very strongly implied that it is. And 'trusting' the President is not a valid basis for kicking the last wobbly support out from under the 4th Amendment, so that future Administrations aren't bound by it at all.