From:
The Journal of the Federalist Societys Practice Groups
October 2006
INTERNATIONAL LAW & NATIONAL SECURITY: THE PRESIDENTS WIRETAP IS CONSTITUTIONAL
BY GERALD WALPIN, starting on page 121
Here's a snippet of his essay:
As when Hitler candidly telegraphed his threatening intentions to the world, initial Islamic militants threats left the world unmoved. In 1998, Osama bin Laden declared a religious war against the United States, calling on all Muslims to assume the moral obligation to kill U.S. civilians and military personnel. Even al Qaedas implementation of that crusade in the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen and the U.S. embassy in Nairobi did little to awaken our country from its lethargy. The result was the 9/11 devastation, killing over 3,000 innocent U.S. civilians.As the bipartisan 9/11 Commissions Report later found, our institutions charged with protecting our ... national security did not understand how grave this threat could be, and did not adjust their policies, plans and practices to deter or defeat it, but rather continued to follow practices used in a different era to confront different dangers.
The threat has not dissipated, but increased, since 9/11. In 2003, Osama bin Laden promised to continue to fight America and to continue martyrdom operations inside and outside the United States. His cohort, al-Zawahiri, declared war in the crusaders own homes. And, true to their word, their large-scale attacks in various parts of the world have resulted in the death and serious injury of large numbers of innocent people in Madrid, London, Amsterdam, Indonesia, Egypt, and Iraq. More recently, both bin Laden and al-Zawahiri have repeated their purpose to inflict devastation on the United States and other western democracies.
Has the reality of this threat shaken this country from its complacency? Immediately after 9/11, important steps were taken to strengthen our defense against terrorism. Congress enacted the Patriot Act, which removed many of the handcuffs imposed on our intelligence capabilities: the most famous example being a still-difficult-to-understand prohibition against law enforcement agencies working with intelligence agencies in full cooperation ....
bump to post 160 for later reading