The Surveillance Moment

[Commentary] As the surveillance debate has raged, often free of fact and reason, President Barack Obama has often seemed like a bystander to his own policies. He now plans to break his silence with an intelligence reform plan. The best response would be for Congress to mitigate the damage so the next President is not permanently weaker.

Part of the reason this debate has been so long and ardent is that reasonable people -- e.g., those not invoking the Stasi -- worry about the potential for surveillance abuse. There's still no tangible evidence of domestic political spying, but the best deterrent is to severely punish the culprits if they are ever found. The surveillance moment nonetheless calls for Republican maturity. An executive order can be undone but legislation that degrades US antiterror defenses will do more lasting harm that won't appear until the next successful attack. The debate is an opening for the GOP's adults to recover some of their own national defense credibility by defeating the worst of the Obama-libertarian proposals. Partisanship and paranoia are bad reasons to endanger the country.