You Are Now Entering "The Dead Zone" (music swells)

The President warns that terrorists are planning attacks on American soil “that will make Sept. 11 pale in comparison.” Glenn Greenwald refers to Bush’s apocalyptic views about the “Dead Zone” of Protect America/ if we revert to FISA laws this weekend:

FISA was not enacted in 1842. If we are "forced" to
live under that law for a few weeks or even longer,
we are not "going dark." We are not "more
vulnerable" to the Terrorists Who Want to Kill Us.
Even under FISA, the Government is fully able to
eavesdrop on all of the Terrorists and suspected
Terrorists their hearts desire.

FISA was enacted in 1978 and updated multiple
times since then to accommodate all the modern
technologies Terrorists use, including cell phones
and computers. It was even amended in October,
2001, when a Congress that was even more
compliant than it is now gave the President every
change he wanted to that law.

One really has to wonder how stupid the President thinks we all are. The idea that all hell will break loose if we suddenly have to live the way we did before he stopped paying any attention at all to the FISA court is ludicrous. The government spied on suspected terrorists and foreign spies long before this Administration stopped using any law at all to do it by and it will continue to do so long after this President is a bad memory.

Using the FISA law for a few days, instead of cowing to the demands of a lawless Administration, might be a habit-forming exercise and lead to more use of available civil liberties. Who knows, after a while, we might look more like a democracy…