I'm the Horned One. The Devil. Let me give you my card.

As consumers of information, as most of my friends who read this blog no doubt are, It's fascinating to me how disparate tidbits of information gel into the larger narrative. Just this morning I'm reading Digby's take on yesterday's Comey testimony before congress and Josh Marshall's continuing coverage of the U.S. Attorney firing scandal and am struck by how very much alike these two scandals are.

First Digby -

How over-the-top must this have been for staunch Republican John Ashcroft to have risen from his ICU bed to argue against it and the entire top echelon of the DOJ were preparing to resign? These are not ordinary times and the law enforcement community has not been particularly squeamish about stretching the Bill of Rights. None of those people are bleeding heart liberals or candidates for the presidency of the ACLU. For them to be this adamant, it must have been something completely beyond the pale.

My suspicion has always been that there was some part of this program --- or an entirely different program --- that included spying on political opponents. Even spying on peace marchers and Greenpeace types wouldn't seem to me to be of such a substantial departure from the agreed upon post 9/11 framework that it would cause such a reaction from the top brass, nor would it be so important to the president that he would send Gonzales and Card into the ICU to get Ashcroft to sign off on it while he was high on drugs.

Then Marshall -

If you look over the broad scattering of documents thus far released on the Attorney Purge, there's at least an argument to be made that it unfolds something like this. Someone gets the bright idea, very early in 2005 to can all of the US Attorneys or a lot of them. But for one reason or another the idea gets rejected or just dies a slow bureaucratic death. However it happens, by the end of 2005 the idea's basically moribund.

But then in early 2006 some problems come up -- a rising wave of Republican corruption scandals and declining Republican political fortunes. And the US Attorney Purge idea gets revived -- but now with a much more specific focus, with an eye toward the 2006 and 2008 elections. Certain US Attorneys become more of a problem with expanding corruption investigations.

If I'm sure of anything with regards to what the founders intended for this country it's this: the power of the federal government should never be engaged in partisan political activities. The modern Republican party as embodied by the Bush administration seems to care less about this truism.

This is just one of the examples why I consider the Republican/ Democratic party are equivalent argument absurd. The Democrat party has a hell of a lot of problems. But nothing they could do could compare to the sheer un-American evil we've seen out of Bush and his crew in congress this past six years.

Whatever I feel like I wanna do. Gosh!

Missing from this rather silly Newsweek article on the domestic spying phone number database are more than a few things that should already be clear to even the thickest of reporters.

• The program was started before the 9/11 attacks. To continue to say that the program was a response to the attacks is specious.
• The article states "Given a hard choice between security and privacy, most Americans would probably choose to sacrifice some of the latter to get more of the former. " That's a pretty damn big assumption that goes against everything this country was founded on.
• "There can be no doubt that Bush correctly read the public mood in the days and weeks following the 2001 attacks. " He ought to have been reading the constitution instead.
• "And had the president sent a bill up to Capitol Hill giving the NSA broad powers to wiretap and eavesdrop inside the United States, in all likelihood, the lawmakers would have shouted it through." Holy hell in a handbasket. Do the words Total Information Awareness mean anything? Congress SPIKED the damn program when it was called something else. The administration just moved it under the auspices of the NSA.
• "True, the administration's spymasters confidentially briefed congressional leaders on the new eavesdropping program." Until the administration provides a full list of just WHICH congressional leaders were briefed an when they ought not to get away with this claim. An alert reporter would catch that.
• Most legal experts seemed to agree that the government could collect a huge database of phone records without violating the Constitution's ban on "unreasonable searches and seizures." What he hell? They talked to "most" legal experts for this article? They probably interviewed three "experts" from the Heritage Foundation and only one had misgivings. I also wonder if they asked them about the second half of the amendment that specifically mentions warrants.

There's a lot more there but it's making my head hurt. I still remain stunned at the willful ignorance of the issues so many reporters work under. There is no possible way that those that are supposed to wallow in this information day in and day out so that then can distill into simpler form for consumption by the mass public can be so friggin' clueless about so many basic issues. These guys (supposedly) have a college education yet they display absolutely ZERO capacity for critical thought.

You only live twice, Mr. Bond.

Have I mentioned I really, really hate Democratic political strategists?

Case in point:

Democrats Won't Focus Hayden Hearing on Surveillance (Update1)

May 10 (Bloomberg) -- Democrats say they will focus their fire on Michael Hayden's military background and suitability to head the Central Intelligence Agency when Senate confirmation hearings begin next week -- and won't emphasize the nominee's role in running a much-criticized eavesdropping program.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aZV7lb4R6XxY&refer=us


Absolutely. Let's focus on what appears to be the non-issue of a Director of the CIA who is currently in the military and completely ignore the fact that the man has shown, under oath, that he is totally ignorant of the text of the fourth amendment to the constitution.

I'm sure this is part and parcel to Rove's gamesmanship of the NSA issue, portraying it as the number one thing Republicans will be hitting Democrats on in this fall's elections. Jeebus Democratic politicians are easy to play.

I MEANT to do that.

Today's news that the Senate Intelligence Committee won't be investigating Bush's domestic spying program after all has to be a tremendous shock to all of us. Who would have thought that Pat Robert's committee, the same Committee that's continued to drag it's feet on "phase 2" of the use of intelligence by the Administration in the run-up to the Iraq War would spike a look at warrantless eavesdropping by this same Administration? Color me surprised.

I'm realizing that watching these guys squeeze and contort their way out of traps of logic brings out the same sick, strange mixture of feelings one gets watching an average episode of "Jackass." One part bemused awe, one part focused revulsion and a big part plain old embarrassment. (Whether it's embarrassment for the performers or ourselves I think is debatable.) We've all become perpetual rubber-neckers driving slowly by a horrible accident and trying not to look.

When this story broke two months ago it seemed once again like one of those "gotcha" moments in politics where a political party makes a misstep so enormous it falls well outside of the normal conventions of traditional political skullduggery. The language of the 1978 FISA law, not to mention the Constitution of the United States, seemed pretty unambiguous in it's language. In order for our government to intrude on the privacy of it's citizens it simply needs to acquire a warrant. The Administration refused to get such a warrant before initiating eavesdropping. They've clearly violated both the FISA statute and the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. Caught between an Administration who boasted loudly and publicly that they'd actually engaged in the spying and the clear letter of the law, the Administration's supporters in Congress were faced with Damocles Sword.

But then Roberts started his Contortionist act. This would be the biggest challenge of his career. (Admititedly made easier by his naturally spineless condition .) Could he worm his way between the letters of the 4th Amendment, up through the clauses in the FISA statute and still loop himself back around towards absolving the Administration of any wrongdoing? Was there ever really any doubt?

Thursday, they voted to forestall hearings in favor of developing White House-backed legislation establishing clearer rules for the controversial program. Sen. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio, is drafting legislation that would exempt the NSA program from the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act but limit eavesdropping to international calls.

Get that? They're going to okay Bush's program retroactively. I stand in awe and deliver a hearty golf clap towards the sheer enormity of this bitch-slap to objective logic and the rule of law.

Of course they can't ACTUALLY change the FISA law after-the-fact. There's this tiny little clause in the Constitution that reads "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."

What they can do, what they WILL do, is change the law then say something along the lines of "We meant to do that but just never got around to it, therefore it's our fault Bush had to break the law. Sorry about that." It's simply a loophole that Congress forgot to consider when they drafted the FISA law 30 years ago.

As for the violation of the Constitution, ever heard of the term "Originalism?" Conservatives, who take an "original" approach to interpreting the Constitution, are obviously in the best position to inform us of what the Founders intended to include in the text but mistakenly let slip through the cracks. Perhaps it was an edit that just didn't make it to the publisher. I have not doubt that Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito will reaffirm this position shortly.