For the past couple of weeks, I've been trying to write a post about the NSA spying.  But I find it hard to string words together -- I sputter with indignation and inchoate rage, that a supposed democratic government would have the brazen gall to behave in such a fashion.

I don't see how it can be legal, based on both the Constitution and the FISA of 1978.  And the justifications given by Bush and the administration seem so painfully thin as to be transparent...and that's given them the most generous benefit of the doubt that I can.  I'm forced to conclude that this is a power grab by the executive on an unheard-of scale.  Checks and balances don't seem to exist anymore, and we are stuck in the maelstrom of a self-declared "war" that will never end.  One that apparently justifies all sorts of lost freedoms, broken laws, and special authority for our "Commander-in-Chief."  No matter if it rides roughshod over the very things that make us Americans.

There was an op-ed in the Miami Herald by Robert Steinback posted Monday that says what I want to say, far better than I can:

One wonders if Osama bin Laden didn't win after all. He ruined the America that existed on 9/11. But he had help.

If, back in 2001, anyone had told me that four years after bin Laden's attack our president would admit that he broke U.S. law against domestic spying and ignored the Constitution -- and then expect the American people to congratulate him for it -- I would have presumed the girders of our very Republic had crumbled.

Had anyone said our president would invade a country and kill 30,000 of its people claiming a threat that never, in fact, existed, then admit he would have invaded even if he had known there was no threat -- and expect America to be pleased by this -- I would have thought our nation's sensibilities and honor had been eviscerated.

If I had been informed that our nation's leaders would embrace torture as a legitimate tool of warfare, hold prisoners for years without charges and operate secret prisons overseas -- and call such procedures necessary for the nation's security -- I would have laughed at the folly of protecting human rights by destroying them.

If someone had predicted the president's staff would out a CIA agent as revenge against a critic, defy a law against domestic propaganda by bankrolling supposedly independent journalists and commentators, and ridicule a 37-year Marie Corps veteran for questioning U.S. military policy -- and that the populace would be more interested in whether Angelina is about to make Brad a daddy -- I would have called the prediction an absurd fantasy.

That's no America I know, I would have argued. We're too strong, and we've been through too much, to be led down such a twisted path.

What is there to say now?

All of these things have happened. And yet a large portion of this country appears more concerned that saying ''Happy Holidays'' could be a disguised attack on Christianity. . .

Bush would have us excuse his administration's excesses in deference to the ''war on terror'' -- a war, it should be pointed out, that can never end. Terrorism is a tactic, an eventuality, not an opposition army or rogue nation. If we caught every person guilty of a terrorist act, we still wouldn't know where tomorrow's first-time terrorist will strike. Fighting terrorism is a bit like fighting infection -- even when it's beaten, you must continue the fight or it will strike again.

Are we agreeing, then, to give the king unfettered privilege to defy the law forever? It's time for every member of Congress to weigh in: Do they believe the president is above the law, or bound by it?

(my emphasis.)

Read the whole thing here.

And I don't understand how anyone that calls themselves an American -- no matter who they voted for, no matter what side of the aisle -- can fail to object to the ongoing rape of the Constitution and the constant stream of lies.

Comments

[Valerie]

You should have been a defense attorney specializing in constitutional law.

[tizzie]

Or president! You should have been president, since you would do a helluva lot better job than the one we have.

Actually, so would I.

[Vidiot]

Not to diminish a possible Tizzie Administration, but so would my dead hamster I had when I was eight.

[Vidiot]

I just wish we had presidential candidates that talked the way Steinback writes.