Free Republic

WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The House Judiciary Committee today approved two landmark bills fighting the War on Terror. The first, H.R. 6054, the "Military Commissions Act," establishes terrorist tribunals and was approved without amendment by a 20-to-19 margin. All 17 Democrats today voted against this legislation, which overwhelmingly passed the House Armed Services Committee last week by a 52-to-8 margin. The second bill, H.R. 5825, the "Electronic Surveillance Modernization Act," updates and reforms the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to fight the modern terrorist threat and provides increased congressional and FISA Court oversight of surveillance operations. After adopting...

Congress is working on bills that would square the Terrorist Surveillance program with FISA Court Rules. However, one bill sponsored by Republican Congresswoman Heather Wilson of New Mexico would require that we be hit with a terrorist attack before we are legally allowed to surveil. Yes, you read that correctly. Republicans are proposing a bill that says we can't initiate surveillance until after we've been struck by a terrorist attack. What would be the point of surveillance then? The attack will have already taken place; innocent Americans will have already died. -snip Take a look at what Rep. Wilson says...