Breakin' the Law, Breakin' the Law!

MTP opens with two video clips, the second one is from Bush's January 23, 2006 speech at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kan.:

...when people say to me, 'Well, he was just breaking the law'. If I wanted to break the law, why was I briefing Congress?"

Followed by a very audible "heh" while he leans forward on the podium and smirks at the audience.

This Contra Costa [CA] Times
article has that quote preceded by "It's amazing.."

Yeah, amazing stuff. Who are the "people" who say to Bush that he was breaking the law? Rove? Andy Card? That would be truly amazing. What Bush means is "when I hear that some people are saying..."

Bush's embarassingly poor command of the English language coupled with his exaggerated Texas accent and his sarcastic posturing make him sound like a dimwitted Cowboy Movie villain sippin' some whiskey at the Saloon.

Are You Being Briefed?

Right after the clip, Pumpkinhead [Russert] launches aggressively into the questioning starting with Daschle:

Russert: "...were you briefed and to what extent?"

Daschle's answer is rambling and far too long. "I can't get into the details...".

He tries to make the point that he knows far more now about the surveillance program from the news articles than he knew after he was briefed 2-3 years ago. So, no, he was not fully briefed at all. Good point, but poorly executed.

Tom Daschle's way of speaking on TV always annoyed me. From the days when he would give the Democratic "response" to the State of the Union. Then, as now, he sounds patronizing. Smiling as he speaks slowly and softly. He needs to hire Howard Dean's Media Trainer.

I Object!

Russert: In those briefings, did anyone object to the plan?

If this isn't a GOP/White House talking point already, it will be soon. "If this NSA surveillance program is so illegal and terrible, why didn't you Democrats say so at the time? Why didn't you try to do anything about it?".

Somewhere in his rambling response Daschle mentions Sen. Rockefeller's letter. A concise response would have been to say "Sen. Rockefeller raised objections to the Vice President and he was ignored".

Sen. Pat Roberts follows the Right-Wing storyline by saying his recollection of the briefings is that nobody raised any objections. He says the briefers would ask the briefees if they had any questions or concerns.

Luckily for Daschle, Pumpkinhead helps him out by reading Rockefeller's July 2003 letter.

Tell No One About What You Have Seen Here

Roberts responds with a stream of absolute horsehockey:

Sen. Roberts: Well, you know, that letter was kept in a safe for three years.

What is he trying to imply here? That Rockefeller waited three years to send the letter? This is demonstrably false. That Rockefeller should have taken the letter out of the safe and leaked it to the press sooner?

According to Rockefeller he wasn't even allowed to tell his fellow Senators about it. It was classified information that had to be kept super-secret.

These concerns were never addressed, and I was prohibited from sharing my views with my colleagues.

Roberts goes on to say that Representatives and Senators have a "variety of tools at their disposal" if they're upset with the program. He mentions that they could "de-authorize the program" or write an amendment. He says that "feigning helplessness" is not a useful tool. Daschle has a look of quizzical amazement on his face, but tries to smile at the same time.

Democrats could never have de-authorized the program all by themselves, without the cooperation of the Chairman of the Intelligence Committee (Roberts). It would be especially hard to introduce an amendment on the floor if they were forbidden from even mentioning the program's existence.

This is a lesson Democrats repeatedly fail to learn about their "go along to get along with the Bushies" strategy. The GOP/White House gets what it wants, Dems get nothing in return and when things go horribly wrong (like, Iraq, fr'instance) they turn around and say "you guys signed off on this, or at least you didn't try to stop us, so you're just as responsible as we are".

Why Didn't You Say So Sooner?

Rep. Harman: I talked to absolutely no one about it, because I would have been violating about three federal criminal statutes had I done so.

Pumpkinhead grills the Democrats about why they didn't singlehandedly shut down the prorgram or why they didn't raise more objections, sooner, to more people. Harman responds with a good point:

She could not even ask her staff or outside experts to advise her on the constitutionality of the surveillance program under penalty of law. Only after Bush spoke about it after the NYT article was published, she began to have people research the legal issues. That is why the Democrats didn't speak out in public about it then and why they are doing so now.

Jane Harman looks and talks like someone who you don't want to mess with. Despite a couple defensive assurances that she supports the program and the war on terra, she was direct and convincing.

Above the Law

Pumpkinhead changes the focus to FISA.

Roberts: The President has the constitutional authority, it rises above any law passed by Congress.

Roberts rattles off the GOP FISA talking points:

- It's hard work

Roberts makes a hand gesture to indicate the thickness of a FISA warrant application. Daschle shakes his head.

- It's old

Why not try to revise it to account for modern technology?

- It's legal anyway because the President has the constitutional authority to operate outside the law in time of "war"

Says who? Why don't we let the congress and the judiciary branch make that determination rather than take the executive branch's word for it?

- It's too slow

Daschle retorts (sheepishly) that surveillance can begin immediately if a retroactive application is made within 72 hours.

- It's only for intercepting communications between foreign terrorists and people in the US

What about US to US communications? The Senators got close to it in last week's Abu Gonzales hearings, but I don't think they ever asked him, specifically if ALL surveillance in the US is done through FISA warrants. This would be a great question for Scotty "Sucka MC" McClellan.

- It's authorized by the AUMF (Authorization for the Use of Military Force) signed by Congress after 9/11

Pumpkinhead reads from Daschle's December 23, 2005 WaPo op-ed where he describes how he and Congress refused to add the words "in the United States" to the AUMF so that the authorization would only apply to operations OUTSIDE of the US.

The online video seems to die about half way through the show and the transcript still isn't up. So, from memory:

- Pumpkinhead plays the clip of Bush's Buffalo, NY speech where he says "every time you hear wire... tap, we're talkin' about gettin' a court order" and asks if Bush was misleading the American public. Harman and Daschle hem and haw their way out of responding to the question. A blown opportunity. How can there be any other answer than a resounding "yes"?

- Dick Cheney has asserted that Congress "leaks like a sieve". Harman got right into the Plame case and Pumpkinhead referenced the Murray Waas article revealing that Dick Cheney authorized Scooter to leak classified information about Wilson's wife's identity. Dick has no place saying anything about no leaks.

- Also the issue of the White House and the Pentagon's selective misuse of pre-Iraq war intelligence came up in reference Paul Pillar's article. He is the the intelligence community's former senior analyst for the Middle East.

Russert grilled (lightly, more of a sautee) Roberts about phase two of the Intelligence Committee's report on how WMD intelligence was used. He reminded Roberts that he had promised on a previous appearance to deliver this report. Roberts reiterated his promise to complete this important report sometime before the sun burns out.