The Bush Administration has an abysmal record when it comes to serving the interests of the American people. They have not hesitated to put politics ahead of all other considerations, even in the War on Terror. Perhaps their most notorious act is when they outed NOC CIA operative Valerie Plame.
The Plame affair is not an isolated case...it's the starting point of a journey that leads to Bush Adminisration wiretaps on Democrats and how to prove they exist.
After Plame...
At the end of July 2004, the Democratic National Convention had generated a great deal of coverage for John Kerry. Kerry was enjoying a post-convention bump when the Bush Administration hijacked the news cycle with a (yet another) breathless report about a pending terrorist attack.
When a skeptical press wondered why this report should be taken seriously, the Bush Administration put politics ahead of all else: they supported their claim by blowing the cover of a British informant who was deep inside of Al-Queda.
In 2006, the Bush Administration again put politics ahead of all else: they blew an Israeli operation to infiltrate Al Queda in Iraq.
Time and again, the Bush Administration has compromised the War on Terror in order to gain political advantage. Their actions demonstrate that winning the War on Terror is not a high priority for them. They pursued their warrantless wiretap program far more vigorously than they pursued Bin Laden...hell, they even let him get away. So, why was their warrantless wiretapping program a demonstrably higher priority than winning the War on Terror?
Since they obviously weren't serious about winning the War on Terror, why did they have such an urgent need for a domestic surveillance program?
Let's put this program into perspective.
The Bush Administration has not hesitated to break the law in order to gain political advantage. They broke the Hatch Act when they tried to hijack the GSA for the Republican Party.
Furthermore, the politicization of the DOJ demonstrates that they are also willing to use Federal Law enforcement power for political advantage.
So, why would they even hesitate to use intelligence gathering power to their political advantage? Why would they draw a line there? When have they ever hesitated to put politics ahead of all other considerations?
Ok, this argument is reasonably compelling...but it's only conjecture. How would we know if this is actually happening? How could we prove it?
Recall that the Bush Administration politicized the DOJ by infiltrating it with "loyal Bushies". When these loyal Bushies are compared with their competitors, their qualifications are laughable. Bush's DOJ rejected Summa Cum Laude graduates from Harvard and Yale in favor of graduates from Pat Roberston’s Regent University. The primary qualification sought wasn’t competence; it was loyalty to the Republican Party.
We should be looking for a similar pattern of infiltration in the domestic intelligence community. If the Bush Administration has been using warrantless wiretaps for political advantage, then they would only trust loyal Bushies to execute those wiretaps.
So....has there been a pattern of appointments in domestic intelligence/FBI that resembles the pattern recently uncovered in the DOJ? Have poorly qualified candidates filled key domestic intelligence posts? Have loyal Bushies been put into positions where they can spy on Democrats?
If there is such a pattern, then it's a treasure map to the evidence that will finally bring this Administration down..