Democrats still don't get it on the enemy intercepts

Jim Rutenberg:

Until last weekend, President Bush had repeatedly fallen short in seven months of battles with a Democratic-led Congress that would not give him what he wanted on immigration or education, health care or energy policy.

But the Congressional vote that authorized eavesdropping without warrants on international communications, including those involving Americans within the United States, has shown that there is at least one arena in which Mr. Bush can still hold the line: terrorism. (See, “Democrats, Republican accusations of being weak on ...”)

The Democrats’ critique of Mr. Bush’s conduct of the war in Iraq certainly contributed to their victory in midterm elections last November. And the Democratic candidates for president can count on thunderous applause when they attack Mr. Bush for his failure to capture Osama bin Laden, and for a heavy-handed approach at home.

But while the Democrats had hoped to leave town for the August recess on an upbeat note, Mr. Bush and his party succeeded in outflanking them with veiled — and not so veiled — warnings that any failure to give the president the authority he sought would leave his rivals liable in the event of another terrorist attack.

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“Everybody was afraid they might be branded as soft on terrorism,” Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, a Democratic presidential candidate, said Monday while speaking to Iowa voters.

Like 27 other Senate Democrats, including his presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton, Mr. Obama voted against the eavesdropping provision, but found himself on a losing side of a Republican-led coalition, in which 16 Democrats joined 43 Republicans and one independent in approving the measure, 60 to 28. In an interview on Monday, Mr. Obama lamented that Democrats had “become comfortable with the rhetoric George Bush uses.”

In interviews, Democratic leaders and their aides acknowledged being outmaneuvered by the White House, which they accused of negotiating in bad faith, and portrayed the bill as a runaway train. Both sides agree that after a series of briefings by Michael McConnell, director of national intelligence, on potential threats to the nation and what he saw as crucial gaps in the surveillance law, they agreed to work together on a new set of provisions before the August recess.

Yet the bill that passed the Senate on Friday and the House on Saturday attracted mostly Republican support. In all, only 41 House Democrats voted for it and its inclusion of new powers to force the cooperation of telecommunications firms and to tap into e-mail correspondence and telephone conversations without court approval; 181 House Democrats voted against it.

Democratic leaders said they did win agreement that the authority would be in effect for only six months, at which point it would be revisited, though the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi immediately called the law “unacceptable” and vowed to change it sooner. Vice President Dick Cheney urged Congress to make the law permanent.

The arguments behind the expanded wiretapping power — that failure to grant it would result in attacks here — were reminiscent of those Republicans aimed at Democrats in the 2002 Congressional election, which brought a Republican victory and arguably helped Mr. Bush a year later to win Democratic votes authorizing the use of force against Iraq.

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And Democratic memories are still fresh with attacks Mr. Bush used in 2004 against Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, a presidential rival he portrayed as “weak on terror.” That Mr. Bush would succeed this month — and on a program as controversial as the eavesdropping by the National Security Agency — was somewhat surprising, given that the White House has seen its credibility on war and terrorism perceptibly erode this year.

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This "analysis" and this editorial demonstrates the the NY Times also does not understand the damage it has done to our national security by it concerns about the privacy rights of our enemy. The 27 senators who voted against this authorization will have that vote hung around their neck in the future and those of them who are candidates for President will be explaining their concern for terrorist rights through the 2008 campaign.

This issue just cuts against the position the Democrats were taking and they never had the political support of the country on the issue. While many of the Kos Kooks support terrorist rights, they are way off the fringe on this issue. There is absolutely nothing wrong with intercept enemy communications and there is especially nothing wrong with intercepting communications they may have with their agents in this country. Trying to stop that or taking the chance on missing those communications to jump through hoops that Democrats want is just ridiculous. It is indefensible and that is why they lost on the issue.

They have actually compounded their problem on the issue by making the deal temporary. This means they will have to vote again on it in six months and remind voters one more time of their weakness on fighting our enemies. The President was not playing politics on this issue, but the Democrats clearly want to play to the Kos Kooks.