FISA Fight: Crying wolf. Again.

AG Mukasey and DNI McConnell say the nation's security agencies have "lost intelligence" because Congressional Democrats haven't capitulated to Bush's will.

The Bush administration informed Congress on Friday that the government has "lost intelligence" because of the expiration of surveillance legislation caught in a political tug of war.

"We have lost intelligence information this past week as a direct result of the uncertainty created by Congress’ failure to act," says an underlined passage of a six-page letter signed by Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey and Director of National Intelligence J. Michael McConnell.

If it's true the telcos are not participating--and the letter provides absolutely no evidence to back up that claim--how do we know it's because of such uncertainty? It seems far more likely that the government blew off paying them for their services again. Remember this?

WASHINGTON—Telephone companies have cut off FBI wiretaps used to eavesdrop on suspected criminals because of the bureau's repeated failures to pay phone bills on time....

In at least one case, a wiretap used in a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act investigation "was halted due to untimely payment," the audit found. FISA wiretaps are used in the government's most sensitive and secretive criminal investigations, and allow eavesdropping on suspected terrorists or spies.

There's also a completely reasonable and simple solution to gain the telcos' cooperation even without amnesty: go the damned FISA court--which is still there, and not as busy as it used to be since they decided to bypass it--and get the damned warrants.

Here's Harry Reid's response to this latest volley:

"The President sadly continues to choose confrontation over negotiation, threatening to veto any extension of the Protect America Act while crying wolf about the dangers of letting it expire.  These latest scare tactics represent the President at his most unreasonable, irresponsible and misleading.

"No amount of fear mongering will change the fact that our intelligence-collection capabilities have not been weakened since last week.  Even the President’s own Director of National Intelligence agrees.

"But for the President, this debate isn’t about protecting America; it’s about protecting the telecommunications industry and his own Administration.  He has explicitly refused to compromise on immunity for telecommunications companies even as he claimed the law’s expiration endangers Americans. I can only conclude, then, that the President would put Americans’ lives on the line to let phone companies off the hook.  Democrats have different priorities."