Do you remember your President Carter?

I know, you'd rather not, but those who would argue that the current flap over Bush's non-NSA approved wiretapping need to understand how easy it is to refute their argument. What Bush is doing is hardly without precedent.

Carter in 1979 issued the following executive order:

http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/eo12139.htm

There are similar executive orders that Clinton issued as well. There is also an open question whether FISA really applies in this instance; it’s very much a separation of powers issue; can Congress pass a law that enjoins the executive from doing what is his primary responsibility, that is, to protect and defend the nation? The Supreme Court had a chance to rule on this issue back in 2002 and refused to even hear the case. The actual case is here:

http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/terrorism/fisa111802opn.pdf

This is 56 pages long, so you probably won’t want to wade through it. But the point was, if the Court was inclined to stop the practice, they could have done so, but didn’t. So I am simply suggesting that this is all about nothing.