Stones Cry Out

No matter one's political viewpoint, it is hard to get around the fact that this was an extremely aggressive position for the President to take. Was it akin to Lincoln's suspension of the writ of habeus corpus or Roosevelt's rounding up of certain American citizens and putting them in nice little camps? No. But just because the President has inherent authority to do something does not mean that it was a good idea to actually do that something, or to do it that way he did it.

The President might be forgiven a little aggression considering this was started just days after 9/11 and they'd gotten fresh intel from a terrorist's laptop. Temper that with Congressional review, internal reviews every 45 days, and even suspension of the program for a time due to legal concerns, and I don't really see this as being "extremely" aggressive.

Considering how much flack Bush received for not connecting the dots to figure out 9/11 was going to happen, what do you think would've been the backlash if another terrorist disaster had hit just a few weeks or months later and he hadn't been aggressive about this intel? He would have, rightly, been pilloried for it.

No doubt about it, and we have the luxury of this debate because there have been no other 9/11 events. I would have preferred that he seek a declaratory judgment from the FISA court, even after he began the program we are discussing, to insulate himself from the recklessness claims he is now facing. This is easy enough to do, and if he had been ruled against by the FISA court, then he could have sought to have the law changed, which, given that the Patriot Act was just passed overwhelmingly, does not seem like it would have been all that hard to do.

Doug writes: So five judges, including one of those who wrote the FISA Act, say that Bush was well within his rights to do what he did, ...

As explained today on Glenn Greenwald's blog Unclaimed Territory, this is bollux. The Washington Times, in this case, is full of it.

All five judges took great pains to say explicitly they were not testifying about whether Bush was violating the FISA law with his so-called "Terrorist Surveillance Program" and the Times simply reported the opposite. In fact, it doesn't take much effort‚ as shown in the article I linked above, to see that all five judges implied they do not agree that the President has the power to conduct wiretaps of American citizens without judicial or legislative oversight.

Now, here's Doug— once again— repeating right-wing misinformation unquestioningly. Why has Stones Cry Out become nothing more than a conduit for GOP talking points?

You overstate your case. There are quotes from the transcript that back up the Washington Times' view of it, just as there are quotes, taken in isolation, that would tend to back up the NY Times take. If you read some of the conservative blogs linked from Greenwald, you'll see quotes that include Judge Kornblum saying that no President has ever (ever!) agreed to the idea that Congress can legislate away his constitutional powers, which is one of the things this hinges on. The portion of the WT article quoted above has another line backing this up.

In fact, the WT article also notes that the judges unanimously believed that FISA should be updated to deal with new technology, giving their general backing to it. That's far more balance than the NYT article, which ignores Kornblum's substantive quotes entirely and spends more time on Judge Robertson, who didn't attend but left a letter that was generally critical.

So we have two short articles summarizing a lot of testimony. The Washington Times shows some of both sides, supportive and critical of the program, and the New York Times article only shows one side. And you are prepared to accept the NYT at face value and hand-wave away the WT account as "right-wing misinformation". Sounds like, in your mind, any information supportive of the President is by definition misinformation. No fariness and balance from you, eh?

And (again) there was oversight, by Congressional leaders. The judges were giving their opinions that it ought to be judicial oversight instead. This still doesn't speak to the legality of the program, which Kornblum specifically covered and which the NYT conveniently ignored. I'll agree that saying all 5 didn't specifically say that was an overstatement on my part, but it was said, and that is news, especially to Sen. Feingold. And apparently to you and anyone who just gets their news from the New York Times.

Talking points indeed. Which paper is only giving one side of the story? That's where you'll find your talking points.

The fact remains, Doug— the Washinton Times reporting was blatantly and obviously false in the one important respect I called you out for repeating: asserting that the five judges testified that President Bush did not violate the FISA statute.

Why should anyone be surprised that you cannot bring yourself to issue a correction to this misinformation, even after it is brought to your attention? You have offered no additional support for the proposition, because it is simply, factually wrong.

If you have any integrity, you will post a correction to the front page. Do you have any integrity, Doug?

Done, and on the front page. Judge Kornblum, while not speaking specifically to this particular program, in general he said that Bush did have a general constitutional right to create such a program. But not all five did. The Washington Times overstated the case, though the case itself was indeed made.

The more substantial point is that one judge did note that the constitution supports Bush and the NY Times ignored this, presenting instead the impression that all the judges gave Bush no legs at all to stand on. That is patently false. That they did this with an omission is no less a breach of fairness and balance.

The WT noted an important point that was made, but left the impression that more than the one person made it. All the information was presented but some of it was given slightly too much weight. The NYT ignored the point. The information was not presented at all. That's more of a problem. But you strain at a gnat while letting the swarm have its way.