White House Sticks To Wiretap Argument

WHITE HOUSE STICKS TO WIRETAP ARGUMENT
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Ben Winograd benjamin.winograd@wsj.com]
Despite high-profile legal losses and complaints about failures to consult with lawmakers, the Bush administration is sticking to its core post-9/11 legal argument: that the Constitution and a congressional resolution passed after the terror attacks grant the president almost unlimited power to protect the country. Responding to congressional inquiries, administration lawyers have defended a warrantless surveillance program viewed by some as in doubt after a recent Supreme Court decision barring special military commissions to try enemy combatants. In letters to Congress, administration lawyers wrote that the high court's decision -- which rejected arguments similar to those used to defend the National Security Agency program -- didn't affect its legal analysis. The release of the letters came as Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) announced a bill, drafted in negotiations with the White House, to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the law critics say President Bush violated by authorizing the program. While Sen Specter has said the legislation -- to be considered today by the Senate Judiciary Committee -- wouldn't affect the president's legal footing, many scholars called it an attempt to retroactively validate the administration's position.
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