For more than two years now, Congress, the news media, current and former national security officials, think tanks and academic institutions have been engaged in a profound debate over how to modernize the law governing electronic spying to keep pace with technology.
We keep hoping President Bush will join in.
Instead, the president offers propaganda intended to scare Americans, expand his powers, and erode civil liberties.
- and to ensure that no one is held to account for the illegal wiretapping he ordered after 9/11.
Consider the performance on March 13, as the House debated a sound bill that closes some technology gaps in the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and gives government agencies new flexibility to eavesdrop, but preserves constitutional protections against unreasonable the contents of the bill and threatened to veto it.
He accused House leaders of “putting in place a cumbersome court approval process that would make it harder to collect intelligence on foreign terrorists.
” Actually, the bill merely ensures that special judges continue to supervise surveillance of American citizens.
The “cumbersome process” is really a court that acts swiftly and has refused only a half-dozen of more than 21,000 wiretap requests in its nearly 30 years of existence.
Mr. Bush said it was vital to national security to give amnesty to any company that turned over data on Americans without a court order.
The purpose of this amnesty is not to protect national secrets but to make sure that the full damage to Americans’ civil liberties is never revealed.
Mr. Bush wanted the House to approve the Senate’s version of the bill, which includes Mr. Bush’s amnesty and does not do nearly as good a job of preserving Americans’ rights.
We were glad the House ignored his bluster.
If the Senate cannot summon the courage and good sense to follow suit, there is no rush to pass a law.