Senate Rejects Wiretapping Probe

The Washington Post reports today that the Senate Intelligence Committee will not investigate the legality of the NSA warrantless wiretapping program. Instead, Congress will work with the White House to revise the FISA law to accommodate the desires of the Administration. This is a ridiculously obvious case in which the Congress eschews its oversight role and hands more power to the executive branch. This is how democracy moves towards facism by legal (although highly suspect) legislative action. In addition, by agreeing that the FISA law needs to be revised to accommodate the NSA program, the White House has agreed that they violated the FISA law. The Post reports: "[Scott] McClellan and [chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee Pat] Roberts cited efforts by committee member Mike DeWine (R-Ohio). DeWine, who will face a tough reelection battle this fall, is drafting legislation that would exempt the NSA program from the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act [FISA]" What essentially happened is that the Congress has said the President can do whatever he wants and the Congress will, once the program is leaked, change the law to bring the President's actions within the law. While other hearings will be held, they will be held in closed session and deal less with determining whether the President broke the law and more with presenting the appearance of oversight. the New York Times has a scathing editorial today, quoted extensively below:

"Is there any aspect of President Bush's miserable record on intelligence that Senator Pat Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is not willing to excuse and help to cover up?"
[...]
Mr. Roberts had promised to hold a committee vote yesterday on whether to investigate. But he canceled the vote, and then made two astonishing announcements. He said he was working with the White House on amending the 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, to permit warrantless spying. And then he suggested that such a change would eliminate the need for an inquiry.
[...]
Mr. Rockefeller said the White House had not offered enough information to make an informed judgment on the program possible. It is withholding, for instance, such minor details as how the program works, how it is reviewed, how much and what kind of information is collected, and how the information is stored and used.

Mr. Roberts said the White House had agreed to provide more briefings to the Senate Intelligence Committee — hardly an enormous concession since it is already required to do so. And he said he and the White House were working out "a fix" for the law. That is the worst news. FISA was written to prevent the president from violating Americans' constitutional rights. It was amended after 9/11 to make it even easier for the administration to do legally what it is now doing.

FISA does not in any way prevent Mr. Bush from spying on Qaeda members or other terrorists. The last thing the nation needs is to amend the law to institutionalize the imperial powers Mr. Bush seized after 9/11.