The land of the not-so-free?

Who would have imagined that the United States of America, the shining beacon of freedom to so many in the past who yearned for a better life, who longed to live "the American dream", would one day find itself the land of the not-so-free.

I'm referring not only to the Bush administration spying on American citizens without warrants, but to the other violations of our privacy which we just haven't found out about yet. Do you honestly think it was limited to the wiretaps that the New York Times finally reported about? (A spying program which the NY Times was well aware of prior to the 2004 elections, but which they kept the lid on AT THE REQUEST OF THE WHITE HOUSE! Can anyone say 'conspiracy'?)

Now I have no problem with the government listening to my phone calls or going through my emails. I'm certain I haven't communicated with al Queda or called upon anyone to overthrow the government. But if that is all that President Bush was interested in, why didn't he get a warrant? The only reason I can think of is because he knew that the request for a warrant would be rejected.

As I said, I don't care if the government wants to listen to my phone calls if all they are interested in is terrorist activity. But what if they also catch my conversations on the topic of the Iraq war, the budget cuts to programs for the poor and education, or the strong desire to invade Iran? I can guarantee you that my comments are not in President Bush's favor. Am I to believe that a President who secretly spies on his own people domestically and without warrants wouldn't use that kind of information to his benefit? Imagine what he could do if he could catch the right phone call or the right email that got him into the middle of a conversation between his political enemies.

Surely that kind of spying would have to be done without a warrant, wouldn't it?

According to President Bush, he didn't do anything illegal because the Constitution gives him the power to carry out domestic spying because we are at war. Now I've read the Constitution, and I can't find anywhere that it says in time of war the Constitution gets tossed out the window. The President took an oath to protect, preserve and defend the Constitution. Acting in violation of the Constitution hardly qualifies as preserving it.

Oh, and in case anyone is giving the president advice, you might want to tell him that it would have been more convincing if only the Attorney General had been sworn in for his testimony. I know that I generally don't believe what someone says if they refuse to be sworn in. Perhaps he wanted to be sure there couldn't be any perjury charges...