White House relents, briefs lawmakers on wiretapping program

The Los Angeles Times reports that the decision to brief Congress on the details of the program, and not just its legal underpinnings, came as senior figures in the Republican Party "continued to press for a fuller explanation of why the administration chose to bypass current laws that require warrants before spying on people in the United States."

The New York Times reported Wednesday that Heather Wilson (R) of New Mexico, chairwoman of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence called for an investigation into the White House's activities on the issue. Ms. Wilson said she had "serious concerns" about the program.

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"This is a very positive development," said [Wilson], a key member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, who had pressed the matter in repeated discussions with White House officials. "Serious questioning, sharing of information and reviewing of this program began this afternoon."

The Associated Press reports that the shift in position also came as Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R) of Pennsylvania said he would require the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) to review the constitutionality of the administration's monitoring of terror-related international communications when one party to the call is in the United States

As late as Tuesday night, Vice President Dick Cheney was telling the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer (PBS) that there was no need to give Congress any further information on the eavesdropping program. Cheney expressed concern that giving more details to Congress could lead to the disclosure of sensitive information.

In another development, The Washington Post reports that twice in the past four years, a top Justice Department lawyer had warned US District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, the presiding judge of FISA, that the secret eavesdropping program may have been " improperly used to obtain wiretap warrants in the court, according to two sources with knowledge of those events."

The Post reports that the revelations infuriated the judge, who had expressed serious doubts about whether "the warrantless monitoring of phone calls and e-mails ordered by Bush was legal."

James A. Baker, the counsel for intelligence policy in the Justice Department's Office of Intelligence Policy and Review, discovered in 2004 that the government's failure to share information about its spying program had rendered useless a federal screening system that the judges had insisted upon to shield the court from tainted information. He alerted Kollar-Kotelly, who complained to Justice, prompting a temporary suspension of the NSA spying program, the sources said.

Yet another problem in a 2005 warrant application prompted Kollar-Kotelly to issue a stern order to government lawyers to create a better firewall or face more difficulty obtaining warrants.

Newsweek columnist Michael Hirsh writes that while the Senate frets about the "outdated" FISA act, no one is paying attention to the important issue: sheer competence. Hirsh writes that one reason that the NSA is forced to listen to so many calls (thousands according to a story in the Post) "is that the agency barely has a clue as to who, or what, it is supposed to be monitoring."

As our esteemed senators fret over whether the NSA has violated their outdated 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, they are not paying enough attention to the competence issue. And no one seems to recall that the same Senate intelligence committee report from 2002 also criticized the "NSA's cautious approach to any collection of intelligence relating to activities in the United States," and its "failure to address modern communications technology aggressively." In recent years the agency tried to do so, but failed. To little notice, a giant $1 billion-plus program called Trailblazer that was to have brought the NSA up to date in data mining and pattern analysis���transforming the NSA's blizzard of signals intelligence into an easily searchable database���has turned into such a boondoggle that, one intelligence official says, "nothing can be salvaged out of it." "It's a complete and abject failure," says Robert D. Steele, a CIA veteran who is familiar with the program.

Finally, Seattle Post-Intelligencer columnist Joel Connelly writes that "civil liberties restrictions in wartime bring out the worst in even our best presidents." He also adds that few of the restrictions imposed on civil liberties over the years made any difference to the outcome of the struggle that was taking place at that time. But then, after the fear has passed, "the nation returns to its senses."

A formal apology for the World War II internment of Japanese Americans was passed by Congress and signed by President Reagan 45 years after the fact. Today, a former internee sits in the president's Cabinet. The disgraceful wiretapping of Dr. King was mentioned by former President Carter Tuesday at the funeral of Coretta Scott King. We develop regrets later.

When the war on terror is done, what do you want to bet that historians will write about Bush administration restrictions on civil liberties and how these excesses made no contribution to the outcome?

Also...
• Iraq construction funds go to security (Washington Times)
• Rage over cartoons perplexes Denmark (Washington Post)
• The Danish cartoons: a neo-colonial slap (Daily Star, Lebanon)
• Feedback appreciated. E-mail Tom Regan .