McConnell Selectively De-Classifies in Order to Cover Gonzales' Ass

From the WaPo:

"The Bush administration's chief intelligence official said yesterday that President Bush authorized a series of secret surveillance activities under a single executive order in late 2001. The disclosure makes clear that a controversial National Security Agency program was part of a much broader operation than the president previously described."

In other words, since Gonzales is under fire once again, we are willing to admit that we've been spying in a lot more ways than you even thought. Since Gonzales said that the Hospital Room Coup wasn't about the "TSP," here's some other things it might be about, which we still won't tell you. But, we're watching you.

And, what I still don't understand is why these other activities aren't also a violation of FISA and since they were all authorized under one executive order, why the President isn't in jail.

This selective de-classification is also convenient in that it comes just as McConnell is also pushing for an "updating" of FISA. And guess what? The Democrats can't wait to look tough on terrorism and so are bending over backwards to pass it. It's like 9/11 all over again, in the sense that politicians are clamouring to do somethng, anything to look like they are doing something about terrorism. (or at least to be able to blame someone else if there is another attack on the "homeland" (my favorite throw back to Nazi Germany). From the NYT:

In the past few days, Mr. Bush and Mike McConnell, director of national intelligence, have publicly called on Congress to make the change before its August recess, which could begin this weekend. Democrats appear to be worried that if they block such legislation, the White House will depict them as being weak on terrorism.

“We hope our Republican counterparts will work together with us to fix the problem, rather than try again to gain partisan political advantage at the expense of our national security,” Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, said in a statement Monday night.

So, to quote post festum from post 544:

But all this is window dressing: Bush directly intervened and took it upon himself to continue the operation of a program that the OLC -- the one and only voice that is always taken as dispositive in matters of law in the Executive Branch -- and that means that yet again Bush and several others are felons.