Gonzales Defends Legality of Surveillance WASHINGTON - Attorney General Alberto Gonzales insisted Monday that President Bush was "acting with authority" both under the Constitution and federal law in eavesdropping on Americans without warrants as part of the war on terror. But his strong defense of Bush's program was challenged by Republican Sen. Arlen Specter, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who told Gonzales that even the Supreme Court had ruled that "the president does not have a blank check."

But the War on Terrorism, like the War on Drugs (thanks Ronnie!), are these convenient, open-ended "Wars" that do little for the American people except waste our tax money and often put our military unnecessarily in harms way. If the President is to have unlimited power in times of war, what's to keep the President from declaring a perpetual war?

Answer: nothing, especially with a Congress to busy cashing their payoff checks.

And on a related note on terrorism, there was a nice article in the L.A. Times about how difficult it was for the U.S. to muster support for sanctions against Iran because of the fiasco in Iraq. For some strange reason, other countries no longer believe our President when he says the sky is filling with WMDs. That's the problem when crying wolf. Behind an Iraq there's an Iran.

And for those who keep posting quotes from the Clinton Era, trying to make it look like Iraq is all Clinton's fault, remember that 9/11 happened on Bush's watch with bin Laden *STILL* at large and with the costs for Iraq approaching a half trillion - that's *TRILLION* - dollars, our economy is being savaged by corruption and unaccountability*.

* Yes, it looks like the economy is going gangbusters because the most common and obvious way of looking at it is how the stock market is faring. The market is improving becuase many companies are laying off people to improve their bottom line.

Hey, instead of fighting to get Democracy installed in Iraq, can we get it installed here first?