The Wiretapping Bill: President Bush, and Fear, Lead the Senate Off a Cliff
By The Editorial Board
The results were so thoroughly precooked that there was no surprise in the Senate’s 69-to-28 vote today to gut a law that has protected Americans from spying by their own government for 30 years.
Still, it was distressing — and depressing — to watch Congress wrench Americans’ civil liberties back to where they were in the days before Watergate, when the United States government listened to our phone calls whenever it wanted.
We had hoped, at least, that the supporters of this awful bill would make a substantive case for their position. Instead, they offered up the usual thick stew of fear mongering mixed with big chunks of disinformation. [more]