Yesterday a local news source in Southern California,
Press-Enterprise, printed the following editorial that lacks both logic and understanding of the law. The author uses the foiled terrorist plot in London as an excuse to legitimize warrantless domestic spying. This is just another uninformed echo of similar tripe being spewed by "conservative journalists" across the country.
Original editorial below:
Constant vigilance is the price of liberty in the age of Islamic jihadism. News that British authorities foiled a plot to commit "mass murder on an unimaginable scale" is welcome, but Americans have little reason to celebrate.
Rather, the alleged conspiracy should spur more people to imagine the unimaginable -- and support government efforts to use every legal avenue to prevent future attacks.
British and U.S. officials on Thursday described a "well-planned and well-advanced plot" to blow up as many as 10 U.S.-bound flights from London using liquid explosives carried onto planes in sports bottles. British police Wednesday night arrested 24 men in London and Birmingham and said they were seeking five other suspects in connection with the operation.
Britain's Scotland Yard and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said little on Thursday about the means authorities used to thwart the terrorists. But surely those methods included wiretaps, electronic intercepts and lengthy interrogations -- the very methods that some legislators, pundits and civil libertarian groups have decried as illegal, unconstitutional and "un-American."
The London plot should also remind Americans that the terrorists, whether al-Qaida or others, are patient, persistent and ever more sophisticated.
Above all, terrorists' perseverance underscores why the United States needs more tools, not greater constraints, to fight "the long war."
Clearly, law enforcement and intelligence forces need every legal means at their disposal to "connect the dots" and prevent and disrupt potential attacks. The only thing that should be "unimaginable" five years after Sept. 11 is complacency in the face of an unrelenting enemy.
To the informed reader this argument is faulty on so many levels. Since editorial responses must be short, I focused on one area and sent this letter yesterday.
In response to your August 11 editorial "Thwarting Terror" that promotes the idea that "some legislators, pundits and civil libertarian groups" have decried wiretaps as illegal is misinformed. The authors confusion becomes more apparent in a later comment, "Clearly, law enforcement and intelligence forces need every legal means at their disposal..."
The main word to notice here is LEGAL. Under current FISA law the Federal government does NOT have the LAGAL right to conduct warrantless eavesdropping on American citizens. I want to make it clear that the government has the full, unrestrained ability to spy on foreign terrorists at will. FISA also allows domestic spying with a warrant - the warrant can even be acquired after the fact. What is in question here is the illegal spying on American citizens by the Executive branch without any judicial oversight. This administration has blatantly and arrogantly broken the laws set forth by Congress that the President is sworn to uphold.
It should also be pointed out that both the British authorities involved in uncovering this terrorist plot and any assistance given by American authorities acquired warrants for their surveillance. In this case the Bush administration appears to have actually followed FISA law and requested the appropriate warrants. This incident in London actually supports the logical conclusion that terrorism can be fought without breaking laws and restricting the civil liberties of American citizens. Today
Glenn Greenwald posted a more complete discussion on this topic.
Oh yeah, it was also done without the use of the military or the invasion and occupation of a country that was not linked to the terrorist organization in question.