Gonzales’ Eavesdropping Testimony
Time Magazine’s Mike Allen has an article posted on what to expect from Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ testimony. Here’s a glimpse:
Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales plans to use a Congressional hearing on Monday to lash out at “misinformed, confused” news accounts about President George W. Bush’s warrantless eavesdropping program, and to declare it “is not a dragnet,” according to administration documents provided to TIME. “I cannot and will not address operational aspects of the program or other purported activities described in press reports,” he plans to say in testimony prepared for the Senate Judiciary Committee. “These press accounts are in almost every case, in one way or another, misinformed, confused, or wrong.”
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In pointed written questions posed in advance by Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-PA), Gonzales was asked whether he would “consider seeking approval from the FISA Court at this time for the ongoing surveillance program at issue.” According to 11 pages of answers to the 15 questions, Gonzales will reply, “We use FISA where we can, and we always consider all of our legal options.” Specter has said that warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens is “wrong,” but Senate aides say he has concluded Bush acted in good faith.
Gen. Gonzales starts with 5 legal precedents on his side but he’s also starting in Arlen Specter’s good graces, which is a welcome thing. It also sounds like Gonzales isn’t out to stiff the Judiciary Committee by saying that they don’t pay attention to the FISA courts.
Still, Monday will be a gruelling day, with Gonzales expected to be up there most of the day and with Sens. Kennedy, Leahy, Schumer, Durbin and Feingold likely to grill him mercilessly. The good news is that he’s got the winning side of the debate before he starts testifying.
“Contrary to the speculation reflected in some media reporting,” Gonzales writes, “the terrorist surveillance program is not a dragnet that sucks in all conversations and uses computer searches to pick out calls of interest. No communications are intercepted unless first it is determined that one end of the call is outside of the country and professional intelligence experts have probable cause (that is, ‘reasonable grounds to believe’) that a party to the communication is a member or agent of al-Qaeda or an affiliated terrorist organization.”
In short, Gen. Gonzales will tell the Judiciary Committee what bloggers have known for some time: that the Agenda Media has blown this out of proportion and that looney left liberals have helped in demagoguing this issue, too. Finding that out is as startling as finding out that Bill Gates is rich.
Cross-post at LetFreedomRing
February 5th, 2006 at 10:33 am
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February 5th, 2006 at 12:51 pm
Gonzales’s shouldn’t have to deal with this alone. He should have behind them the top legal minds who know the precedent and constitutional scholors who acknowledge that this is necessary in order to save lives.
It’s a shame the Bush administration doesn’t strike back hard enough at the loony lefts unsubstantiated claims. Just putting Gonzalas against the horde of ACLU lawyers is downright torture.