Stupid Questions Department

Remarks by the Vice President on Iraq and the War on Terror at The Heritage Foundation, January 4, 2006:

Another vital step the President took in the days following 9/11 was to authorize the National Security Agency to intercept a certain category of terrorist-linked international communications. There are no communications more important to the safety of the United States than those related to al Qaeda that have one end in the United States. If we’d been able to do this before 9/11, we might have been able to pick up on two hijackers who subsequently flew a jet into the Pentagon. They were in the United States, communicating with al Qaeda associates overseas. But we did not know they were here plotting until it was too late.

Two questions:

1. How fucking hard is it to get a warrant— or, hell, get one of them retroactive ones (for up to seventy-two hours!) if the call has one end in the United States —to listen in on a phone conversation involving a known al Qaeda associate?
2. Will ignoring FISA make it hard to prosecute terrorism cases in courts that— you know —recognize FISA as binding law?

Please don’t let the answers be, “Who cares?” Please don’t let the answers be, “Who cares?” Please don’t let the answers be, “Who cares?”

This ain’t the way we’re supposed to do it.

[This is the end… but if you want to, click “more” for more of Tricky Dick. Only if you want to.]

The American people can be certain that we are upholding those principles [following the rule of law, respecting civil liberties]. They can be equally certain that our administration will continue to defend this nation to the very best of our ability. As we get farther away from September 11th, some in Washington are yielding to the temptation to downplay the ongoing threat to our country, and to back away from the business at hand. This is perhaps a natural impulse, as time passes and alarms don’t sound. All of us are grateful that our nation has gone four years and four months without another 9/11. Obviously, no one can guarantee that we won’t be hit again. But neither should anyone say that the relative safety of the last four years was an accident. America has been protected not by luck but by sensible policy decisions, by decisive action at home and abroad, and by round-the-clock efforts on the part of people in law enforcement, intelligence, the military, and homeland security. [Emphasis added.]

Check out the balls on this guy!