You forgot the modern liberals.

If there happens to be an overlap between Jews and “liberal ACLU lawyer types in general” as I’ve put it, please enlighten me as to its nature and extent.

And since when are parodies not supposed to make fun of near-Communist anti-Americans? – Oh, when one is a pompous liberal, who only wants parodies going the other way!

The parody is not that far off reality since some Democrats are (again) talking about bringing articles of impeachment against Bush.

Some people make it a very strange world. The Federal government’s job is to monitor and block the activities of well-suspected terrorists – within existing law. The Bush Administration does, and for doing its job, it should of course be impeached. Meanwhile, Clinton was (as we now know) NEGLECTING the government’s national security duties while playing with the interns, and for that, Clinton should of course NOT have been impeached.

Jeremy also has an article on how The DNC Times printed a book ad on the front page.

What the ACLU and others have their pants in a wad over is the fact that our own government had the gall to monitor international phone calls and emails to and from the phones and email accounts of known terrorists and those linked to known terrorists.

More specifcally, they’re hysterical because a Republican government did it. Nobody would bat an eyelash if it was a Democrat president. Actually, they’d be more pissed that it was leaked.

What I want to know is why are we wasting our time with Valerie Plame BS instead of investigating REAL leaks which causing REAL danger to our country?

I think we need to look a little more closely at any leader (again, I don’t care if they are conservative or liberal) who advocates secretly spying on his/her own citizens, no matter how justified we might believe it to be. a lot of governments eventually came down by starting on this path.

That mischaracterizes the situation. Let’s be clear. The government wiretapped legitimately suspected terrorists, in their overseas phone conversations only.

And as allowed under existing law, and in consultation with Congressional leaders of both parties. Keep all that in mind before writing anything too hyperbolic or Andrew Sullivan-ish.

Violations of the law, Gryph.

Of course I can’t speak for Bush and he might well violate the law if it were a question of New York being incinerated in the next 24 hours. But the hallmark of everything this Administration has done, that we know about, has been its conscious and intentional legality (under existing law).

“In the end it matters little whether what the President did broke any laws, its what the people think about the idea of the government wiretapping citizens that will control the outcome of this latest tempest at the White House.”

In other words – You have no real point? Are you saying, ‘If a statistical majority views it as bad, then it is or will have been bad; if a statistical majority views it as good, then it is or will have been good’?

That’s sure what it sounds like… so if not, please tell us what you do mean.

Democracy is after all, an inherently risky system. You can’t have the Democracy without accepting the risk.

This President is vigorously defending his actions by saying this is what he has to do in order to keep Americans safe. So what actions would he NOT be willing to take?

Americans have shown a sensible willingness to suspend the recognition of some civil right in war-time, in order to protect national security. But what about when that war has no conceivable end?

In the end it matters little whether what the President did broke any laws, its what the people think about the idea of the government wiretapping citizens that will control the outcome of this latest tempest at the White House.

As the original article points out, what really kicked this program into high gear was the capture of several al-Qaeda operatives and their phones/address books/computers. The government then worked backwards from those, as one would in a typical investigation.

…Even if the spying was a national security operation, leaked illegally to the media by partisan (Democrat-leaning) officials in an hypocritical violation of all those laws they are worked-up about in the Plame case. Because lovers of liberty should not eternally trust any government officials.

I think the right questions to ask about the spying are:

- Did the Administration restrict it to legitimately terrorist suspects?
- Did the Admin. consult the Legislative and Judicial branches?
- Did the Admin. strictly follow U.S. law, and intend to?

On present information, the answers would be: yes, yes and yes. That’s where, when and why the Democrats should cut the crap.