Doesn’t insisting that national security agencies obtain warrants before listening to terrorists’ phone calls between the United States and other countries effectively prevent all surveillance to foil terrorist attack-plotting?
A Washington Post article dated October 5, 2006 reports the following:
“One hundred and seventy-seven of the opposition party said, ‘You know, we don’t think we ought to be listening to the conversations of terrorists,’ “ Bush said at a fundraiser for Rep. Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.)......
“ Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) called Bush’s comment outrageous: “Every member of Congress, from both parties, supports listening in on terrorist communications, but the president still hasn’t explained why we have to break the law to do it. It is time for the president to stop exploiting the terrorist threat to justify his power grab.”
Isn’t Senator Feingold’s position just a variation on the old admonition, “Don’t go into the water until you learn to swim”?
It’s easy for liberals to say that they favor vigorous measures to combat terrorism, if, at the same time, they impose restrictions that make implementing vigorous measures impossible.
Requiring warrants before listening to telephone calls necessitates knowing beforehand who the terrorists are, what phones they will be using, and what United States telephone numbers they will be calling.
The whole point of broad-spectrum surveillance is to detect telephone conversations by terrorists who use continually changing telephone numbers at both ends of the conversations, to and from continually changing locations.
If our national security agencies are effectively prevented from monitoring phone calls, and if we have no imbedded secret agents within terrorist ranks, doesn’t the liberal position enunciated by Senator Feingold amount to prohibiting all efforts to block terrorist plots before they become effective?
Preferences of liberal Republicans and liberal Democrats suggest that is exactly their intention. They prefer spending more money on first-responder emergency services in the United States, coupled with more feckless palaver in the UN.
In short, liberals want to regain the world’s approval by appeasing the ACLU while quietly awaiting our execution by Islamic jihadists.
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