Unanswered Questions

Questions unanswered from Bush’s press conference this morning:

1. If the secret court allows a 72 hour retroactive warrant and has an extremely high approval rate for requests—I’ve read they only denied presidential requests a handful of times in 27 years—why act without its oversight? Other than expediency, which is a questionable reason given the nature of the secret court, why supersede the court?

2. If the FISA court, which was made to be both secret and expedient, was insufficient, why didn’t Bush seek to alter the FISA court process rather than ignore it?

4. If the spying program is intended for “agents of a foreign power” only, what assurance do we have from anyone other than executive branch officials who report directly to the President (e.g. Department of Justice) that spying was limited only to these known agents? Without court oversight, how can we confirm that this standard for suspicion was met in each case?

5. Bush emphasized that certain members of Congress were informed of the program in classified meetings. What power did they have to investigate abuse and provide oversight? Were they given any valuable details about the program? (Daschle says he was notified but key details were left out, and Rockefeller just released a letter to Cheney that he wrote on the day he was briefed stating severe concern about the program.)

6. Bush said the program was reviewed every 45 days for abuse. Reviewed by whom? What were the review criteria? Who had oversight to assure compliance with program revision recommendations?

7. If the logic is to spy on known agents of a foreign power, why not spy on purely domestic communications? And if this logic aims to protect us from another attack, then why not spy on suspected, not “known”, terrorist associates or contacts? Why not spy on anyone?

8. He authorized the National Security Agency to spy on American citizens without going to a court. Is this a violation of the Constitution and laws passed by Congress? Congress has specifically stated, in statute, that the criminal wiretap statute and FISA “shall be the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance . . . and the interception of domestic wire, oral, and electronic communications may be conducted.” Are there other statutes that have superseded this limitation?