READER REJECTION
Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.’s Woolsey-Eyed Democrats:

Mr. Tyrell [sic],

Why CNN posts your crap I have no idea. Maybe I can find ONE Conservative Columnist that does not lie or stretch the truth like our president (I should say yours, not mine).

In typical factless fabrication, you said Saddam hosted terrorists before the war on Iraq. Would that be Rumsfeld or Cheney? You said that it was common knowledge. Really?

It is lying pieces of shit like you that make me sick to my stomach about the media. Truth, justice and the American Way has no use for you.

I would debate you in a minute (and George for that matter) and win because then you couldn’t hide behind your computer screen.

Quit printing your crap.
— Bob Dillman
Flagstaff, Arizona

NOOSE LIPS
Re: Jed Babbin’s Getting With the NSA Program:

Personally I take the actions taken by the Senators you observed to be clearly High Crimes and Misdemeanors if proven. But I do find in sadly amusing that, we in a state of war, must ponder the consideration of legality if our phone numbers are listed on Bin Laden’s global phone. But one might consider that as a disinformation process, putting 10-20 random numbers out of any U.S. phonebook would be beneficial to Al Qaeda.

But I wish to play devil’s advocate. Under Article VI, Sec 3. — “The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution;…” Then couple that with Amend. IV which defines search and seizure procedures and it becomes very clear that all the members of the Executive fall under the Constitution’s restrictions, FISA or no. Does the Presidency have the right to spy in defense of the realm? Sure. Does that relieve the Presidency or Congress in fulfilling their duties under the Constitution? No.

So whether you consider FISA clumsy, the President is not relieved of his duty to follow some process as defined by Congress that fulfills the provisions set forth in Amend. IV. But you know we pay all of them fair sums of money to divine such solutions. If the Executive, Congressional and Judiciary cannot reach such an accord then pox on them all. Nothing in the Constitution states that all three branches have to be adversarial all the time. I believe this is one of those times.
— John McGinnis
Arlington, Texas

Jed Babbin, in his excellent article on NSA and the need for it, cites that in December 2004 Jay Rockefeller, Dick Durbin and Ron Wyden were under criminal investigation for leaking…. Well, what was the outcome? My guess is nothing. There is never a “rest of the story” in Washington. Jim McDermott was never prosecuted for his part in public disclosure of the Martin’s illegal picking up on their CB radio and taping a cell phone conversation between New Gingrich and John Boehner. Jay Rockefeller writes memos that go nowhere, designed solely as CYA documents. “Journalists” are quite sanguine when it comes for bird dogging a story on a Democrat. It doesn’t happen.

Whatever happened to treason? Whatever happened to hanging for treason? How about tar and feathers? Too painful for our tolerant times? How about honey and feathers? Yellow feathers. Jay would look like Big Bird, Dick would look like a fat fryer and Wyden? Maybe a picked capon. I personally favor a gallows constructed on the mall. As the saying goes: Nothing concentrates the mind like the prospect of one’s own hanging…. Our country is worth dying for — at the end of a rope, if one betrays it.
— Diane Smith
South San Francisco, California

Do the dunces running this circus comprehend the harm they’ve done to the country by broadcasting the eavesdropping programs existence? Can’t they put their grandstanding aside and understand this was done to protect American lives? And why the breast-beating and shouting after the fact? Here’s something else: Do Democrats realize this is a winner for the President? These antics make it look like they care more for the rights of terrorists and those in league with them rather than ordinary citizens! If President Bush gets really critical; watch liberals and their media cohorts retreat; shouting McCarthy as they retreat. Here’s a prediction; Republicans pick up two additional Senate seats, based on the issue of national security.
— Bob Montrose
Fort Lee, New Jersey

“We have met the enemy and he is us.” Never were these words more true than they are today. Mr. Babbin is spot on in everything that he has said here. My problem is this, why haven’t we heard this day after day and multiple times each day from everyone in the administration starting with George Bush?

Bush came out of hibernation a couple of weeks back and gave a few strong speeches. Now we have had the SOTU speech and, it seems, that Bush is scurrying back to his “new tone,” rope-a-dope mode.

Where is the Bush “war room” to handle charges and lies by the political opposition? When is Bush going to finally realize and admit that a charge left unanswered is a powerful IED causing casualties to the administration, and indeed, to the whole American body politic? Bush, by his behavior, has taught the Dems that they and their pr firm, known as the MSM, have nothing to fear from the Bushies. The public sees charges going unrebutted and says, “Well, there must be some truth to the charges.”

Where are the prosecutions of betrayers of the nations secrets, whether they be prominent Dems or not? Why does the White House refuse to name names in the few and mild responses to scurrilous political posturing that undermines our so called “War on Terror”? And while I am at it, why do Bush and Rove insist on rewarding liberal Repub cut throats, like Specter, Chafee, et al,, when they have true conservative Repubs (not RINOs) willing to take on these liberal moles within our ranks? Bush helped defeat Specter’s Repub opposition. The White House is working as hard as it can to insure a primary win for Chafee. They tried everything that they could to keep Bush loyalist Katherine Harris off the ballot in Florida.

In 1776, it was said that we would have a republic, if we could keep it. It does seem to me that we are in the process of throwing away that chance to keep it. I can not think of a single conflict, armed or political, that has been won be someone with one hand tied behind his back while the opponent used both hands and all possible weapons and tactics. Bush damn well better wake up and smell the coffee, because Iran is about to raise the ante, on the theory that we are too timid and divided to dare go “all in.”
— Ken Shreve

Jed is so right in so many ways on so many different levels. The Democrats will attempt to reprise their role in the Alito hearings with the most vituperative of them being prime suspects for the leaking of sensitive national security secrets. Watch which Democrat is the most sanctimonious and you’re probably looking at a unindicted felon. Only Jay Rockefeller, the biggest hypocrite of them all, will not be there to play the role Ted Kennedy did with Justice Alito. But, Arlen Specter is equally shameless & equally hypocritical. The author of the super-duper precedent while on Meet the Press yesterday was so concerned about the “illegality” of the NSA program under Pres. Bush that both he and Russert managed to avoid the elephant in the room, (pardon the pun) i.e., the obvious illegal act of the New York Times in printing these secrets. I guess Specter has been too busy to read the Espionage Act, especially as to what it says about the dissemination of such secrets and what the applicable punishment is.

I also suspect that Specter thinks Pres.Bush is more a danger than Pinch Sulzberger. After all, with Russert giving Specter his marching orders about not going after the MSM for their felonious conduct, Specter appeared all to eager to oblige. We can’t possibly have the Senate hold hearings on the conduct of the NYT & the MSM, that would create some messy problems for the professional ruling class and expose the MSM in ways no politician has the guts to do. No, better we go after Bush, it’s safer and the Senate Dems and the MSM will oblige in the hoax.

Finally, Jed’s point about these hearings and their inability to distinguish between the gathering of wartime intelligence and civilian law enforcement, speaks volumes on just how irresponsible the Senate is. We’re at war and their focus is on scoring political points. These hearings will play into the deliberately false impression created by Howard Dean that Bush is listening in on domestic calls in order to obtain information for future domestic prosecutions. If this distortion wasn’t so dangerous to our security as a nation, it would be laughable….
— A. DiPentima

I would like to know if Senator Specter, who seems to have spearheaded these hearings, really is worried about spying on Americans or if he justs knows the hearings are good for Republicans and bad for Democrats. Or maybe he just wants face time?
— Howard Lohmuller
Seabrook, Texas

After the weekend long seeing and hearing the uproar over political cartoons and the shrill rage of destruction that commenced, anyone who does not realize we are in a war that we either win or lose our lives, well, suffice to say many Democrats won’t. The stuck on stupid motto is now stuck on destroying the U.S. They cannot do otherwise as they have hardened hearts that will not allow them to see the nose on their face.

However, I still say that those of us who are providing the ones who fight for our freedom need to decide we have had enough and descend on Washington, D.C. in great numbers to let those on the hill know we have had enough of their leaking secrets to our enemies and placing our loved ones in harm’s way with their rhetoric.

I wonder if the terrorists were already here and ready to take heads if some Congressional folks would step up to the plate first to show us there is nothing to fear from terrorists?
— B. Gunn
East Texas Rancher

The sad part of all this is that our borders are STILL not protected and more terrorist can still come in. I am all for listening in on calls to or from terrorist that have one end in America, but let’s stop the import of more across our border.
— Elaine Kyle

WHO ELSE?
Re: The Washington Prowler’s On a Jay Walk:

I do hope a good many Americans will be watching the hearings regarding the NSA leaks — to really see what is at stake here — and it’s not that our government is going to spy on you or listen to your phone calls (unless, of course, you’re holding conversations with known al-Qaeda members). And think about it… do you think al-Qaeda members are still talking on the phones? Nope, not since they were alerted to the NSA program by some fine American Patriot. A great quote in this article — from the Dem staffer — suggests the leak culprit was “a Republican with a conscience” but that people would just automatically think it was a Dem Senator or staffer. Let’s see… why would American’s think that? What party consistently acts in its own interest politically and is obsessed with the re-acquisition of power, and hates the Bush Administration, and is soft on national security? I vote for a Dem Senator or staffer — it’s all in the playbook. This is the Dems’ ticket to impeachment, you know. Forget that they’ve had about half a dozen or so other tickets to impeachment on trains that never left the station. Perhaps by 2008 they will have spent so much time looking for the right tickets, the trains just won’t stop for them anymore.
— D. Hawkins
Spartanburg, South Carolina

DOING SOMETHING
Re: Michael J. Horowitz’s Right Abolitionism:

Could it be that one principal reason the modern-day American left — including members of certain minority political parties, as well as many who call themselves liberals — is so apoplectic about the Bush administration’s efforts is that the administration is actually doing something, rather than flapping its gums, as its critics are doing?

Too, could it be that the critics are overtly resistant because they have no contacts in the real world that can educate them?
— C. Kenna Amos Jr.
Princeton, West Virginia

Wasn’t it President Clinton who justified his inaction about the international trafficking of women and girls with the rationalization that “Some slavery is voluntary”?
— Bob K.

Thank you for the article on prostitution.

I direct your attention to Women at Risk of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Their website is www.w-a-r-e.org.
— Merlin Perkins

BEST BUY
Re: Christopher Orlet’s Phonies and Freeloaders:

That review of Mandelbaum’s book makes me want to run out and get it. Some people just say so much better what I feel in my gut.

Most of what you print in TAS should be required reading for all. Without you I’d be lost to find the truth (well — maybe O’Reilly too)

Thanks,
— Joan Moriarty
Stuart, Florida