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Home Front: Politix

McCain: Bush Right to Use NSA

2005-12-19

McCain stands up on this one. It helps GWB and (of course) it helps him for 2008.

Sen. John McCain disappointed Democrats on Capitol Hill on Sunday by defending the Bush administration's decision to use the National Security Agency to monitor a limited number of domestic phone calls in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

Saying that Sept. 11 "changed everything," McCain told ABC's "This Week": "The president, I think, has the right to do this."

"We all know that since Sept. 11 we have new challenges with enemies that exist within the United States of America - so the equation has changed."

McCain said that while the administration needs to explain why it didn't first seek approval from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, he suggested that the Patriot Act might have superseded the 1978 FISA Act, allowing "additional powers for the president."

McCain said the fact that congressional leaders - including top Democrats - were consulted on the NSA authorization "is a very important part of this equation." He suggested that any congressional hearings into the Bush decision focus on that aspect. "I'd like to hear from the leaders of Congress, both Republican and Democrat, who, according to reports, we're briefed on this and agreed to it," he told "This Week." "They didn't raise any objection, apparently, to [whether] there was a, quote, violation of law."

Asked about House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's claim that she "raised concerns" about granting the NSA new powers during one meeting with White House officials, McCain said: "I don't know about any meetings, but I certainly never heard complaints from anyone on either side of the aisle.

"When this process was being carried out I would imagine that the leaders of Congress would be very concerned about any violation of law as well," he said. "Apparently [those concerns have] not been raised until it was published in the New York Times."

McCain also warned that any congressional investigation should take care not to force additional disclosures from the White House that could help the enemy, saying: "I don't see anything wrong with congressional hearings but what kind of information are you going to put into the public arena that might help the al Qaida people in going undetected."

Posted by:Steve White

#16 CTD:

FISA does not cover all situations. And it requires court orders to operate. And its targeted more at conventional "cold-war" scenarios, with long baselines of observation, and little motility of the targets.

The parts of the patriots act talking about keys, pen registers, etc - those are vital. Go look them up. Basically, they allow an intercept to continue across borders and media. Something the old laws never knew was possible.

Example: Under FISA you need a warrant for each connected device, each person, and each place.

Now apply that to tracking an Al Qaeda perative talking to his fundraisers. He is on a sat phone, and using email from a kiosk in Pakistan. He is also texting as well as talking. Talking to a cloned Cell Phone in LA California, a SKype client on a PC in FLorida via VoIP, and flips to text to a Blackberry in Buffla NO, and pop a SMS to a "pay as you go" cell phone in Atlanta.

Now you figure out how get proper warrants for all this under FISA - which never accounted for Blackberrys, pay as you go cell phones, kisos email, VoIP via Skype, or the internet.

Bush had the attorney general and the directors and other people that knew the law draw up guidelines for him to act legally under the law, including the Patriot Act and AUMF, to secure the safety of the US against terrorists. He even updated Congress when these means were used.

Nothing to see here except the Dems and their press allies trying to smear the President regardless of truth or cost, and the NYT trying to sell a book from the whole mess. All of them ignoring the damage done the nation by the leaks and exposure of means and sources fo intelligence that can result in grave damage to the nation's ability to ddefend its citizens agains the enemy.

Posted by: Oldspook 2005-12-19 22:15

#15 I agree: 2008 is going to be extremely ugly, and then there will be a unbelievably large number of unemployed Democrat politicians.

Posted by: trailing wife 2005-12-19 22:13

#14 Getting a warrant from the FISA court can take months. Info like cell phone numbers has to be acted on within hours or days, lest their owners catch wind and disappear again.

I have a question too. The NSA has been listening to international comms for ages. That's their primary mission, is it not. Why is this news?

Posted by: ST 2005-12-19 18:40

#13 Can someone explain why this was necessary?

I too am curious. What advantage is there to circumventing the FISA courts? I have yet to hear a rationale explanation.

Posted by: DepotGuy 2005-12-19 13:46

#12 Not being a lawyer (nor playing on on the net), I don't know the legality of this. But if a certain, very libertarian law school professor doesn't believe it's illegal, that's good enough for me.

If there's a loop hole that lets the gov spy on US citizens with no accountability, it's Congress's job to deal with it legislatively. Unfortunately, whenever Congress "addresses" intel agency matters the results are usually disastrous.

Posted by: Xbalanke 2005-12-19 11:15

#11 Trust me on this one gang, Bush holds all the cards and there was NOTHING illegal about what he did. I sincerely hope that someone goes to jail over this leak. It would be a bonus if it was one of the Dhimmis on the Intelligence Committee. I hate to spill the beans but don't look for Clinton to say anything against this.

Posted by: Cyber Sarge 2005-12-19 11:15

#10 What people also seem to be missing is what Bush brought up in his speech last night. Maybe it was "illegal", as CTD states (I, for one, don't think it's illegal, if run as explained, and in fact, you'd have to be a 9/10/2001 mindframe idiot to NOT wanna spy on domestic jihadis talking to overseas counterparts), but the far bigger issue was that it could also be very "illegal" to disclose the program (for Nat'l Security reasons). Thus, the very disclosure of it to the NYT should send someone to Levenworth.

Posted by: BA 2005-12-19 10:54

#9 CTD is about as wrong as any one can be. I think the Bush folks are holding their guns fairly silent. When it gets ugly all they will have to do is release one Instance where the wiretaps helped stopped a terrorist attack. Then they could go after the Dems for sedition and the NYT for aiding the enemy. This has the potential for getting really ugly for the Dems. Imagine in 2008 the add showing the Dems supporting the terrorists and a shot of the city that would have been destroyed under their rule.

Posted by: 49 pan 2005-12-19 10:30

#8 Anybody wants to listen to my phone calls, be my guest.

They're going to be bored shitless.

Posted by: Redneck Jim 2005-12-19 10:28

#7 Can someone explain why this was necessary? FISA approved just about every request ever brought to it, and the existing law allowed the taps to be up and running for 72 hours before the request was submitted. What problem with the procedure set out in the legislation was this policy supposed to solve?

Every defense I've seen seems to focus on the need for these kinds of taps, which no one with any sense is questioning - I'd like to hear the rationale on why they felt they needed to sidestep a pretty permissive system that seemed to be working. I've never heard that problems with the FISA set up prevented the USG from getting something done.

Posted by: Ebbavimp Omaique1795 2005-12-19 10:20

#6 If you think 2004 was a nasty election process, hold on to your hat. 2008 is going to be UGLY. I predict the GOP is going to recycle all this defeatist, alarmist, nihilistic propaganda and serve it up to the American public as a refresher course on what it means to be a liberal.

Posted by: bigjim-ky 2005-12-19 08:56

#5 Let's see, CTD......

The NYT, a de facto arm of the DNC, "sat" on this for a year.

And released it in conjunction with a book publication and a major political victory in Iraq.

Going to the link in your post, I was amazed, even impressed, by the way that there were posts which contained "facts" and faux "legal opinions", that could not have possibly been the work of two or three days. Clearly this whole thing was planned weeks if not months ago, and operatives put in place to simultaneously storm the MSM and crappy leftist blogs like the one at your link. No different from the Murtha and so many others.

I must say I am impressed. The Clinton era fax-machine-talking point agitprop program has definietly been upgraded. Maybe you leftists are having a go at learning how to subvert the Internet to your infotainment control program.

Funny, though, how it isn't working......real Americans seem to be supporting W more and more as he talks about it, even as leftists push their masturbatory dream of impeachment and "frog marching" etc.

Posted by: no mo uro 2005-12-19 06:49

#4 There's nothing foul at all about intercepting calls to terrorist suspects living in this country. As long as they weren't monitoring domestic calls I don't see the problem. The problem with this whole thing deals with the fact that we have so many people working for the CIA and NSA willing to sacrifice the security of their country for political gain. That actually scares me a lot more then tapping phones of suspected terrorists and that's what really needs to be investigated starting with that NY Times reporter that considered selling more important than the security of the country. He should be thrown in jail and the key thrown away.

Posted by: BillH 2005-12-19 05:47

#3 Pelosi and Reid deserve jail cells. Sedition, giving aid and comfort to our mortal foe during a time of war.

9/11 changed everything, except these people, they still are total wastes of human skin.

Posted by: Mahou Sensei Negi-bozu 2005-12-19 04:56

#2 yeah, right CTD. Personally - I think the dems really screwed themselves on this one. They could have used the opportunity to say, "see look, we really are tough on terror behind the scenes, we helped to keep you safe". Instead they get little hacks like CTD to come out with the argument about it being "illegal" for our government to evesdrop on terrorists. As if any sane, non-suicidal person would care if they do it. Instead Pelosi and Reid sit quietly and allow the deranged camp to speak, as if informed, and gather momentum about how skeery and terrible it all is. And then when it comes to light that Pelosi and Reid not only knew, participated and kept quiet about it, for years, Pelosi and Reid find themselves on the defense as being a part of this evil conspiracy. I say give them the shovel to dig their own graves before the next election. And while you are at it, give CTD the microphone to present their euelogy.

Karl Rove must be laughing.

Posted by: 2b 2005-12-19 04:40

#1 This is foul stuff. It's very likely that this was illegal, no matter what freakin' Nancy Pelosi says. Why not just use FISA? Why give impeachment ammo to the D's?

Posted by: CTD 2005-12-19 03:59

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