The FISA court has no precedent to form an arguable case for or against the legality of this program; They approve or deny wiretapping requests, they don't argue constitutional law. You may ask, what about the Supreme Court? This law and it's effects will be exempt from oversight by the Supreme Court as the FISA court will be the sole judiciary body responsible for oversight of
..any case before any court challenging the legality of classified communications intelligence activity relating to a foreign threat ... or in which the legality of any such activity or program is in issue.
Why the hoopla?
Not only is President Bush breaking established law by wiretapping American citizens, he is doing so under a flawed and unconstitutional premise of power. The NSA program in question violates the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), and more importantly the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. The President claims however that he has inherent and Congressionally mandated authority to bypass the FISA court (break the law) as a result of the theory of the 'Unitary Executive', a divergent view of the Executive Branch which vests all powers not delegated by Congress or the Constitution to the President, in direct violation of the 'All Powers' clause of the Constitution, which delegates these powers to the people, NOT the President.
By allowing the President to maintain a shroud of secrecy over this program, Senator Specter is giving in to the President's claim that the constitutional authority inherent in the Office of the President is enough to ignore, circumvent and deride Congressionally enacted law and our system of checks and balances.
Should this bill pass, Senator Specter and the rest of Congress will have given the President the authority to spy on the international phone calls and emails of American citizens without a warrant. This is a dangerous precedent that will come back to haunt us when President Bush next pushes for warrantless eavesdropping on domestic communications. The argument now is that if al-Qaeda is calling into the U.S., Bush wants to know who they are calling. The argument soon will be that if al-Qaeda is calling from within the U.S., Bush wants to know about it. We will see an increased focus on domestic terror cells in the coming months, with a push to erase all checks on the President's authority related to eavesdropping.
A quote from Senator Specter's bill:
Nothing in this Act shall be construed to limit the constitutional authority of the President to collect intelligence with respect to foreign powers and agents of foreign powers.Without a definition of 'foreign powers and agents of foreign powers' Senator Specter is creating an obvious loophole for future and increased domestic espionage by the Bush administration.
With a complicit Congress, President Bush is poised to realize the greatest coup of all time: the creation of a fascist America.
President Bush, 12/18/2000: If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator.
Domestic Espionage=Check Please
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