Al-Quaker

In an ordinary world, I wouldn't have to differentiate between multiple domestic spying programs. But in response to a few e-mails: while the NSA numbers-fishing appears to me to be a solid intelligence idea executed completely (and most importantly, unnecessarily) illegally, this Department of Defense spying-on-Quakers shit is insane. I am, however, willing to give them the benefit of the doubt on the Quaker thing; as almost none of our intelligence guys speak Arabic, the spelling confusion probably gummed up the works.

Good general rule: as soon as you have the military doing anything non-military, you have screwed up. And it's not like they couldn't have used these resources to better extent, say, getting more body armor for the troops or maybe doing more than five minutes of post-war planning. Didn't exactly knock that stuff out of the park.

Did you catch today's speech, by the way?

"This authorization is a vital tool in our war against the terrorists. It is critical to saving American lives. The American people expect me to do everything in my power, under our laws and Constitution, to protect them and their civil liberties and that is exactly what I will continue to do as long as I am president of the United States," Bush said.

Under. Our. Laws. And. Constitution. That's the tricky bit. Sadly, I'm fairly sure that the President's grasp of law is thin enough that he genuinely believes that when John Yoo and Alberto Gonzales put memos in front of him and tell him that this shit is legal, he a.) genuinely believes them and therefore b.) is pissed people are obstructing his perfectly Constitutional and legal procedures. The alternative, of course, is immensely more unpleasant.