Here's the Times today on Bush's speech, for background:
WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 - President Bush acknowledged on Saturday that he had ordered the National Security Agency to conduct an electronic eavesdropping program in the United States without first obtaining warrants, and said he would continue the highly classified program because it was "a vital tool in our war against the terrorists."Wow.
In an unusual step, Mr. Bush delivered a live weekly radio address from the White House in which he defended his action as "fully consistent with my constitutional responsibilities and authorities." He also lashed out at senators - both Democrats and Republicans - who voted on Friday to block the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act, which expanded the president's power to conduct surveillance, with warrants, in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The revelation that Mr. Bush had secretly instructed the security agency to intercept the communications of Americans and suspected terrorists inside the United States, without first obtaining warrants from a secret court that oversees intelligence matters, was cited by several senators as a reason for their vote.
...
Mr. Bush's public confirmation on Saturday of the existence of one of the country's most secret intelligence programs, which had been known to only a select number of his aides, was a rare moment in his presidency. Few presidents have publicly confirmed the existence of heavily classified intelligence programs like this one.
His admission was reminiscent of Dwight Eisenhower's in 1960 that he had authorized U-2 flights over the Soviet Union after Francis Gary Powers was shot down on a reconnaissance mission. At the time, President Eisenhower declared "No one wants another Pearl Harbor," an argument Mr. Bush echoed on Saturday in defending his program as a critical component of defending against terror attacks.
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As recently as Friday, when he was interviewed by Jim Lehrer of PBS, Mr. Bush refused to confirm the report the previous evening in The New York Times that in 2002 he authorized the domestic spying operation by the security agency, which is usually barred from intercepting domestic communications. While not denying the report, he called it "speculation" and said he did not "talk about ongoing intelligence operations."
But as the clamor over the revelation rose and Vice President Dick Cheney and Andrew H. Card Jr., the chief of staff, went to Capitol Hill on Friday to answer charges that the program was an illegal assumption of presidential powers, even in a time of war, Mr. Bush and his senior aides decided to abandon that approach.
...
Not surprisingly, Democrats saw the issue differently. "Our government must follow the laws and respect the Constitution while it protects Americans' security and liberty," said Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee and the Senate's leading critic of the Patriot Act. Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who is chairman of the committee, said on Friday that "there is no doubt this is inappropriate" and that he would conduct hearings to determine why Mr. Bush took the action.
...
In his statement on Saturday, Mr. Bush did not address the main question directed at him by some members of Congress on Friday: why he felt it necessary to circumvent the system established under current law, which allows the president to seek emergency warrants, in secret, from the court that oversees intelligence operations. His critics said that under that law, the administration could have obtained the same information.
Here's some response from "critics of the President":
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA):
Feinstein, a member of the intelligence and judiciary committees, called the program "the most significant thing I have heard in my 12 years" in the Senate and suggested that the president may have broken the law by authorizing surveillance without proper warrants.Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) and Salto's Favorite Senator™:
"How can I go out, how can any member of this body go out, and say that under the Patriot Act we protect the rights of American citizens if, in fact, the president is not going to be bound by the law?" she asked.
Feingold's response on CNN this morning: "It's a sad day when the president is deciding to play politics with national security. By saying he authorized wire taps, the president is saying he runs the war on terror and can bypass Congress. There is a pattern of the president not listening to Congress; he feels that even if he doesn't have authority from Congress, he has authority to make up law himself." ... Feingold mentions Gitmo, torture in Abu Ghraib and says he sees a pattern of someone who sees himself as above the law. "It's a shocking series; a shocking record." Feingold says he did not know that this was going on. "If we haven't passed a law to do this, it is illegal. Its a shocking moment in the history of this country."More outraged reaction at Eschaton here.
It is a fact that Bush is a criminal. A felon. 'Member when it was the loonies using the word "criminal"? It's not a particularly good word when it comes to "war crimes" because "war crimes" are kind of hard to define, if you're not genocidin' and stuff.
But Bush admitted to violating the law today. And his executive order was probably unconstitutional as well.
He's a criminal. He needs to be impeached. Cheney too. Gonzalez. Harriet Miers. (Can you impeach non-elected officials?) Then Rumsfeld and Steven Hadley and the rest of the happy-face Iraq crew that lied it up.
Get ready for the shitstorm, everyone. You think it was bad before?
This is the biggest story of the year. Bigger than Iraq, or Plame, or WMD, or Katrina, or Michael "Heckuvajob" Brown. Far bigger.
LINKS:
Digby has must-read background and context here.
See Reddhedd too. She's got some outrage. Not enough, in my mind.
Bush needs to be put in jail with his cronies. I mean it.
[rewritten to add more background material]
