Bush now saying members of Congress "reviewed" the domestic spying program and determined it was appropriate - oh really?

That's what the NYT has Bush quoted as saying in Monday's papers.

When asked about John Ashcroft being reluctant to sign off on the domestic spying program, and Ashcroft's top deputy outright refusing to sign off, Bush gave this response:

Asked Sunday about internal opposition, President Bush said: "This program has been reviewed, constantly reviewed, by people throughout my administration. And it still is reviewed.

"Not only has it been reviewed by Justice Department officials, it's been reviewed by members of the United States Congress," he said.

For Bush to respond to a question, about administration officials opposing the domestic spying program, by saying that members of Congress "reviewed" the program, that means Bush is saying the members of Congress looked at the program in depth, investigated it, and then gave it their seal of approval, AND that Bush would have had to kill the program if the members of Congress did not approve.

But we already know that to be untrue.

Some key members of Congress like former Senator Graham (D-FL), the former head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, weren't briefed at all, so he didn't "review" it. Other Senate leaders either only heard a quick cursory mention of the program in a longer briefing (Daschle and Reid), hardly what one would call a "review," or when they got their briefing they objected quite strongly (Rockefeller) - so even were he to have "reviewed," he didn't "approve."

To say that these members of Congress "reviewed" the program is an outright lie. You don't "review" a program by sitting in a long briefing on another topic and then suddenly someone mentions briefly that this program exists. That's not a "review" of the program. Having your staff do their own investigation and write you a memo on the topic, a memo that asks you for an up or down decision on the program, that's a "review."

And for Bush to imply that Congress approved of this program is also an outright lie. Graham couldn't have approved of something he didn't know, Rockefeller clearly disapproved and told Cheney directly, and there's no evidence to suggest that either Daschle or Reid gave their blessing.

What's more, Bush claimed that just as DOJ "reviewed" the program, so did members of Congress. But DOJ had to sign off on the program, or it would have been killed - we know that Ashcroft held the program up several months, and we know that the White House couldn't proceed with the program because Ashcroft's deputy wouldn't sign off. So a DOJ "review" meant having the power to kill the program. From what we know, Congress was never asked to sign off on the program, lest it be killed - quite the contrary. At least one senior member of Congress complained, the current head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and his complaint fell on deaf ears while the program proceeded anyway. For Bush to liken the DOJ "review" to Congress' "review" is again an outright lie.

And finally, if by "review" Bush simply means mentioning the program's existence in a classified meeting, as he did with certain members of Congress, a meeting where the person hearing about the program has no power whatsoever to stop it, then why should we even care if "people throughout my administration," as Bush now says, "reviewed" this program? Who cares how many people in the administration Bush told about the program if it was the same "review" Congress had - namely, a cursory mention of the program, and the person being told had no power to object and stop the program?

Again, that's not a review - that's a dictator telling his powerless Potemkin advisers, cabinet, and Congress what he's already going to do, with them or without them.

Bush is lying and the media needs to hold him accountable for his lies, rather than just repeating his lies - like the NYT just did - without countering them in the next paragraph with the facts. Read More......

Open thead

What's up? Read More......

Massively nasty windows security flaw, beware

UPDATE: Someone just tried to send me a virus masked as a "Greeting Card." There was a link in the email that said to click it to see my greeting card - the link then pretended it was a link to an image - but if you hovered your mouse over the link without clicking it you see that the link isn't to an image at all, it's to a program. And if you click, you download and run the program. This has to be a virus - anything pretending to be an image (.gif) but really being a program (.gif.exe) is a virus. Just be careful, I almost fell for the thing. If you click the image above you can see what I received, and see the fake link. JOHN

Apparently a particularly nasty Windows security flaw has been uncovered, and this one can screw up your computer by simply visiting a Web page or looking at a picture in your Microsoft Outlook email preview pane. Nice.

Anyway, you can read more about it here.

The Washington Post's blog is linking to an unofficial patch that, while you should use at your own risk, the Post says top security experts are recommending the patch since Microsoft may not have a patch for days. You can find the patch here. Again, use it at your own risk (I did). Read More......

Bush now says that known Al Qaeda members and Al Qaeda affiliates are working in the US, and he hasn't arrested them

Well, isn't this growing curiouser and curiouser. Now Bush is saying that some of the calls he's illegally tapping are being made FROM the US and that the people making them are Al Qaeda or Al Qaeda affiliates.

Bush stressed that the surveillance involved telephone calls from "a few numbers" outside the United States by people associated with al-Qaida, the terrorist organization that plotted the Sept. 11 attacks. The White House later clarified Bush's remarks, saying he meant to say calls going to and originating from the U.S. were being monitored.

"It seems logical to me that if we know there's a phone number associated with al-Qaida or an al-Qaida affiliate and they're making phone calls, it makes sense to find out why," he said.

Really? So now there are Al Qaeda members and Al Qaeda affiliates inside the United States making phone calls, we know who they are, and:

1) Bush is letting known terrorists and known terrorist affiliates roam around our country free, which begs the question: Why aren't they under arrest?

2) Bush is saying that the courts would never grant a warrant to listen to the phone calls of Al Qaeda members or Al Qaeda affiliates inside the United States. That's just a lie.

Ever curiouser how Bush's story about this scandal changes every day. Would be fun to watch him answer questions under oath and then see what he says. Read More......

Open thread

Anything good on TV tonight? Read More......

Conservative icon William Safire criticizes Bush over illegal domestic spying

C&L; has the video. Read More......

Bush now basically claiming that court wouldn't approve warrants to listen in on Osama's phone calls to Americans

That is exactly what he said today, in so many words. Read on.

Now Bush is claiming that the phone calls he was tapping were solely Al Qaeda members calling people in the US.

Bush said the program limited to "a few numbers" called by known al Qaeda members outside the United States.

"If somebody from al Qaeda is calling you, we'd like to know why," Bush said.

If that's the case, then why was it so important that the administration NOT get search warrants? Why were they so deathly afraid that the court would NOT give them a warrant? Is Bush suggesting that any court in the country would reject a warrant to tap a phone conversation an American is having with Osama bin Laden? That's ridiculous, and patently untrue on its face. Clearly that's not who Bush's domestic spying program was targeting, or it wouldn't be a new program requiring new rules, and it wouldn't be "too difficult" to get a warrant after the fact. Any court in the land would give you a warrant on the spot to tape Osama's phone calls.

If that's all Bush was doing, taping the equivalent of Osama's phone calls, then he could already do it under the law. We therefore know that this is NOT what Bush was doing.

So the question remains, what was Bush really doing, who was he really spying on, and why is he now lying about it? Read More......

Open thread

Watching Alien vs Predator on TiVO... Read More......

Illinois law now bans job discrimination simply because you're gay

Job discrimination against gays is now illegal in Illinois.

A point worth reminding folks here:

It is legal under federal law to fire, not hire, or not promote someone simply because they're gay and you don't like it. Anti-gay job discrimination is not illegal under federal law, and it is not illegal under the US Constitution.

A lot of people, straight and gay, don't realize this. They think "discrimination" is illegal in American, and certainly banned in the Constitution. It's not. That's why we had to pass a federal civil rights act in 1964, but that act only covers the categories of citizens ACTUALLY LISTED in the act, it does NOT cover everyone. Here's what the 1964 Civil Rights Act actually says about job discrimination:

It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual's race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.

That's it. The law does NOT ban job discrimination generally, it only bans job discrimination in THOSE CATEGORIES, and therefore does not ban job discrimination based on sexual orientation (or lots of other things).

That is why we've been fighting for so many years for state and local, and federal, laws banning job discrimination based on sexual orientation. Some people claim that gays are seeking these laws to get "special rights," basically because many of those critics actually think it's ALREADY ILLEGAL under federal law to fire someone for being gay. Thus, they don't understand why we want ANOTHER law to provide us protection they think we already have - we must be getting some extra, something "special," in this additional law, they think. But the truth is, it is LEGAL under federal law to fire someone for being gay. That's why we've been seeking those laws.

It's an important point, and one that, as I said, even many gay people don't realize. It is legal under federal law to fire someone simply because they're gay. And while some states now ban anti-gay job discrimination, such discrimination is still legal in 33 or so states.

One final point: A number of cities have passed ordinances banning such job discrimination. And that's great. But it only helps you if you live in that particular city.

Now you know. Read More......

If the GOP is concerned about national security, they'd get Karl Rove

Oh, the feigned outrage from the hypocritical GOP:

Sen. Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican who appeared with Schumer on "Fox News Sunday," urged the Justice Department to "go after those who breached our national security and endangered Americans in the war on terror."

The White House is harboring one of those scoundrels, Senator McConnell. Karl Rove still has access to national secrets...he has a security clearance, yet he breached national security and endangered Americans. Read More......

Sunday Morning Open Thread

Any news from the talk shows? Read More......

Even Bush's Justice Dept. wouldn't approve the spying program

The Bush Justice Department, which is now going investigating who leaked the story about the illegal domestic spying program, wouldn't even approve the program we learn in today's New York Times:

A top Justice Department official objected in 2004 to aspects of the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program and refused to sign on to its continued use amid concerns about its legality and oversight, according to officials with knowledge of the tense internal debate. The concerns appear to have played a part in the temporary suspension of the secret program.

The concerns prompted two of President Bush's most senior aides - Andrew H. Card Jr., his chief of staff, and Alberto R. Gonzales, then White House counsel and now attorney general - to make an emergency visit to a Washington hospital in March 2004 to discuss the program's future and try to win the needed approval from Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was hospitalized for gallbladder surgery, the officials said.

The unusual meeting was prompted because Mr. Ashcroft's top deputy, James B. Comey, who was acting as attorney general in his absence, had indicated he was unwilling to give his approval to certifying central aspects of the program, as required under the White House procedures set up to oversee it.

There is so much to say based on this article. Of course, the DOJ is now headed by Alberto Gonzales. No wonder DOJ is not investigating whether a crime was committed. The head of the department was an accomplice to the President's illegality. Yet, that same DOJ, under the leadership of John Ashcroft no less, had "concerns about its legality and oversight."

When Congress holds hearings (if they ever get the spine to do it), their first witness should be James B. Comey. If the GOP won't have real hearings, the Democrats need to play hard ball. If the GOP won't call Comey as a witness, the Democrats need to play hard ball. No hearings, no key witnesses, then no action in the Senate. Respect for the rule of law is critical to the functioning of a democracy. No one is above the law as the GOPers kept saying when they trivialized the impeachment process during the Clinton/Lewinsky saga.

Now, we are faced with a President who believes he can break the law with impunity. That can't be swept under the rug in a true democracy. Read More......

My New Years Resolution

I promise in 2006 not to start an unnecessary war based on a lie with insufficient troops to whom after three years of fighting I still haven't given enough body armor or a plan for victory.

You? Read More......