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It's especially funny because it's O'Reilly in his characteristic hypocrtical form. ;) Reminds me of all of the times he's denounced Fox programs (esp. when he thought they weren't Fox programs).

Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works James Inhofe.

For reference:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/04/18/rumsfeld/ (April 18th of this year)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/01/washington/01cnd -rumsfeld.html?ei=5070&en=2148bb81cafef9d0&ex=1163 221200&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1163076529-g9kIMjR0v6pCeRK B7CId4A (November 1st of this year)

Source?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboa rd.php?az=view_oet&address=358x1293 (multiple comments liking Saddam to Al Qaeda who was resonsible for the attacks)
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/03/20/9-11-and-sadda m/

Actually, we didn't lie. Believing something to be true that later turns out to be false is not lying.

While your statement is true, it is not true in this case. It has been well established that this administration had already planned to invade Iraq before the September 11th attacks and that any information which did not fit the plan was thrown out.

See this link: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/politics/story/0,69 03,1185407,00.html

Further, it is well known that what limited intelligence we had was twisted to fit the goal. For instance, when the White House was told by Defense Department analysts that aluminum tubes found in Iraq were actually to be used for rockets, the administration found others who thought the the tubes could be used in a nuclear program. Even then Secretary of State Powell, after looking at the intelligence, said the tubes were for rockets. Guess which opinion the White House used.

Then we lied that Iraq was tied to Al Qaeda.

See the link from Democratic Underground I previously listed. There are several quotes in which Bush specifically says that Iraq was tied to Al Qaeda. However, if you want other sources you can try these:

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/attack/140133_bushir aq18.html (Fourth paragraph)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3119676.stm
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0803/080803nj2.htm (3/4 of the way down the page)
http://www.newscloud.com/read/73666/ (Rice making the comment for the administration)

I could go on if you like but I'm sure you can find other sources, including Bush's own comments on the White House web site (if they haven't removed the evidence) which shows Bush linking Iraq and Al Qaeda even though it was well known that Saddam hated Al Qaeda and had given specific orders to his minions not to cooperate in anyway with Al Qaeda.

Well don't download it all. just the things you need to pull down maps of your ranch, or in this case uhm.. liberal anti-american hate speech.

The truly predictable thing about this mess is that Republicans have been asserting that this is a) proof that Hussein was within a year of building a nuclear bomb (it isn't), and b) that this is the NYT's fault.

I mean, nevermind that righty-blogs were falling all over themselves pressing for the release of these. Somehow, they were convicned that opening these documents would unleash an "Army of Davids," and the President pushed to have the documents declassified and published before anyone had the chance to read them. Now that it turns out that, oops, hey, instructions on how to build a nuclear bomb are in there, Andrew Card is blaming - who else? - the NYT.

And this is after they'd already found instructions on how to make sarin in there.

Unbelievable.

> "The Web" and "The Internet" aren't the same thing. At all.

No they are "the internets"

Do ur research pal, they're not the same at all, google it...

One of the things I've used on the Google is to pull up maps

The chief weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, has now issued a comprehensive report that confirms the earlier conclusion of David Kay that Iraq did not have the weapons that our intelligence believed were there.

Really? I thought he was working in Washington, DC these days. You know, "We've never been stay the course."

In short, bullshit. There is a wealth of evidence to indicate that FEMA, DHS, and Bush himself simply sat on their hands and did jack shit while the water poured into the city.

a few years ago bush said loud and clear we would not "tolerate" a nuclear north korea. yet the administration did nothing to deter the advent and now the standard-line is that it was inevitable.

north korea also had more weapons-grade plutonium under bush senior. clinton was the one to make progress in the interim, and now under bush II north korea has nukes. the idea that diplomatically averting nuclear flashpoints ("carrot" approach or whatever you want to call it) is somehow inferior to aggression, threats, and war, is absurd. clinton had his problems, but just read the time-line yourself and you make the call about what the wiser more responsible policy was.

i also can't even believe that somebody earlier in the thread said clinton merely achieved "international oversight" of north korea's nuclear programs--- as if that's worthless. (first of all it's not true: he accomplished an actual reduction of the korean weapons program, in addition to oversight). part of W. bush's rationale for the iraq war was that iraq was a rogue nation that refused "international oversight" of their weapons programs, which isn't even true. (see: paul o'neil)

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/10/07/nk-timeline/

just read the timeline. read the facts. i'm not saying "conservative rule = bad" "democratic rule = great"-- just read the facts. it's a severe understatement to say bush II dropped the ball big-time. we're at war in iraq, thousands upon thousands people are dead there, and they have no weapons of mass destruction. north korea just detonated a nuke and the administration takes no responsibility whatsoever. and beyond that even, bush lied about his north korea policy plain and simple.

And with Colbert remaining 'in character' during the campaigning, he's pick up a surprising amount of the radical conservative vote.

It's anecdotal, but I've seen several reports of Conservatives watching the Colbert Report and coming out of it thinking The Dailly Show and Colbert Report are intended as a balancing pair of radical leftwing and (genuine) radicial rightwing comedy news shows.

You want to really get your mind blown? The Tom DeLay Defence Fund actually used a Colbert interview as the headline proof in defence of Delay. The only question is whether the DeLay people were themselves so stupid as to beleive Colbert was on their side, or whether they were "merely" desperate and relying on the ignorance and stupidity of their support base about Colbert.

-

That isn't true at all. Clinton set the record straight pretty recently in an interview on Fox News, there are also books about it. Transcript available here: http://thinkprogress.org/clinton-interview

While one cannot be certain what exactly will happen, history has shown us that people usually react fairly strongly to anything that gets in the way of their freedom. And Americans have certainly proven this point.

When exactly in the last years?

There is a difference between rumours of elections being rigged versus actual evidence.

I'd say the evidence is there just nobody seems interested in picking it up. Might be because some KGB^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Federal institutions are actively persecuting people who have differing opinions?

Remember: Elections are not a sign of democracy. Hitler was democratically elected (besides, he won most of his wars and took personal responsibility after obviously loosing the last one). They are necessary, but they are not enough.

Think Progress: FULL TRANSCRIPT: Clinton Takes On Fox News
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/09/22/clinton-fox/

Clinton taped an interview with Fox News' Chris Wallace about this today, which is scheduled to be aired Sunday. The interview is supposed to be about the energy initiative, and his charitable work; instead, Chris Wallace ambushes him out of left field with some bullshit hardball question about Osama Bin Laden.

It's hilarious, because not only does Clinton attempt a diplomatic answer, but when Chris Wallace won't let it go and birddogs him, Clinton completely pwns Wallace, then goes back on topic.

I'm curious to see if they actually air it.

Climate Scientist To CEI: Stop Misrepresenting My Research

For the record, I never meant to imply in any way that P&T's Bullshit! is a bastion of flawless logic and peer-reviewed science. Only that I hoped that *anyone* attempting to make *any* argument publicly, would probably try to avoid using 'experts' to support their claims whom had no professional clout at all.

If they were trying to support smoking, you'd hope they'd avoid citing Smokey McSmokerton, Vice President of Phillip Morris as their primary witness. And/or some random homless guy off the street. There's little point in citing 'experts' if those listening to your arguments are completely unconvinced of your experts' expertise.

You must be blissfully unaware of the past 5-6 years of administration appointees. I almost envy you. Nearly ALL appointees over any sort of regulatory watchdog, scientific fact-finding, or pork-laden government spending bureau of the government has been an industry lobbyist of some sort who is assured to make sure that said industry (which donates lots of money to the Republicans) will make out like a bandit (literally) on the taxpayer's dime or taint and all evidence that gets in the way of said industry's profits.

Read more here:
Bush Has Appointed Over 100 Lobbyists as 'Regulators'
WhiteHouseForSale.org | Contributors and Paybacks Articles
Evidence that this has been a pattern of behavior as far back as when he was governor.
Some info on two of the officials reviewing the Dubai Ports World deal
An even longer list of crony appointees

The Bush administration is one of the more shameful examples of cronyism in modern US history. The term "conflict of interest" doesn't begin to cover it. Then, when you can't find a person with experience as an industry shill, you can always go to political advocates with no experience in the field (but solid Bush support):

Michael Brown's two political appointees deputees in FEMA
A petition for Bush to make political appointments with a list of 6 good examples
The Hertiage Foundation even endorsed making political appointees over experienced civil servants in 2001! ...No really, 7 ridiculous arguments straight from the horse's mouth! (How's FEMA workin' out there, HF?)
Why, just look how many Heritage Foundation flacks are now in the administration.

Any wonder why the DHS hasn't done hardly anything useful, why FEMA had someone with no emergency relief experience installed as it's head, why scientists are abandoning NASA, the EPA, the CDC, etc. in droves, and why hundreds of IRS agents that audit capital gains and estate taxes have been downsized? It's government with the wheels taken off -- oriented explicitly to do nothing but enrich special interests by people who have publicly stated that that's all they believe the government exists to do in the first place.

What, you didn't think they meant that they'd try to STOP it when they said that, did you? Yeah, I was fooled too, but not anymore. It's time we get people back in power who believe that the government is meant to serve the people. People who believe that it's part of the solution and not part of the problem. Otherwise, as we've seen, the temptation to just exploit "the problem" is just too much.

I call shenanigans all over that. It's not some vast conspiracy of SUV-loving, gas guzzling eco-terrorists that keeps things as they are

Check this out and the response of the scientist who anti-global warming stuff is based on and finally this study of peer reviewed journals (ie not armchair science)

There are serious scientists who question the theory that global warming or climate change as it's more properly called now is caused by human activity.

Would you point me to some serious scientific studies that shows this?

Echelon complied with FISA. Bush's wiretapping program doesn't.

It's funny how the party that used to talk about "the rule of law" doesn't want to actually comply with the law...

Because an executive order has allowed the telecommunication companies to hide these programs.

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/05/17/new-executive- order/

You guys might want to check this out: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/05/17/new-executive- order/ Bush has signed an executive order that allows the Telcos to lie on their financial statements. It would be almost impossible to prove these programs existed without access to classified information. Another way to prove them, however, would be to detail how much money the telcos receive from the federal government. They are required to report this information to the SEC beecause they are publically traded companies. Bush has signed an order that allows them to violate securities law. Worse off, he did this just a few days preceeding the USA Today article which implies that they had notice ahead of time that they were about to be exposed. We are in for a world of hurt people. Say bye bye to the United States of America as we know it. This is fascism by definition.

Let's not forget more than $100 bucks per vote can get spend by one side on a campaign.

And this is just the elections part of the democratic system, all in all a relatively minor part. (Iraq has plenty of elections)

Lets not forget that the New York Times sat on this very story *for a year* at the request of the white house. Incidentally, this was an election year. (In Iraq you have to pay to decide what gets printed)

The New York Times is the paper that kept Judy miller on the WMD issue after her articles started making less and less sense to experts. The experts complained to the point of getting articles adding nuance to her stories but ignoring most criticism. (Her name later popped up in plamegate (where her jailtime postponed the investigation) and in Rendon group stories).

A democracy can be defined as a system of government where the people can have a meaningful say in they way the country is run. Can you have a meaningful say if you think Cheney just brings Bush fresh pretzels while Bush runs the world?
Can you have a meaningful say if you think the only decisions to be made are pro/con gay marriage and pro/con terrr?

I can think of Weapons proliferation, air pollution killing people directly, air pollution killing our children's children through climate change, the dollar plummeting, oil running out, china becoming a real superpower (which Lockheed martin can do nothing about, despite being the biggest reason the US government points to China), Russia becoming an autocracy (Which Cheney may want to prevent by siding with the Beslan school siege guys... I kid you not!) So what is US TV news reporting on these issues? Any public debate going on?

I would say that the American public didn't know that by electing bush, who looks very handsome when he cuts down trees or rides a mountain bike, that they would get the whole shamrock, Iran contra and PNAC involved Halliburton brand neocon fun pack (now, with free K-street project Abramoff and hookergate). (All of these things pre-date the first Bush election and are the kind of thing one might reasonably look at when deciding trustworthiness)

Lets not forget that Cheney does things intentionally without changing the law because he wants to use 9/11 to re-establish executive power that in his cold war mind has been dangerously taken away by that vicious congress... no really, congress. The people who split up the WMD investigation in a "did the CIA do all of it" part and a "Was the Mushroom cloud part a minor misunderstanding that ended overdoing it a bit or a honest mistake" part. (We are still waiting for the last part.)

But hey, this is just what the European papers make of the story....

If you as an individual permit a search of your person or property, then no warrant is needed and any evidence is likely admissible.

That does not apply to the cases involving the phone companies giving out call information voluntarily. The release of that information without a warrant--which they clearly couldn't get or else they would have gotten one for Qwest--violates US Law.

Communications Act, Section 2703(c), provides exactly five exceptions that would permit a phone company to disclose to the government the list of calls to or from a subscriber: (i) a warrant; (ii) a court order; (iii) the customer's consent; (iv) for telemarketing enforcement; or (v) by "administrative subpoena." The first four clearly don't apply. As for administrative subpoenas, where a government agency asks for records without court approval, there is a simple answer - the NSA has no administrative subpoena authority, and it is the NSA that reportedly got the phone records.

The fact is that when Gonzales told us that the NSA only listens to international calls he didn't take an oath, and that he later rescinded or re-qualified much of his testimony, in particular making the point that although one particlar intelligence program involved listening to international calls, a certain gigantic multi-billion dollar signals-intelligence agency might actually be running more than one signals-gathering program. (Like, whoa, seriously?)

To attach the name "fact" to information obtained under such circumstances is, I think, very, very optimistic, in a sense.

The fact is that Bush has told us bald-faced lies about domestic spying activities, and at this point it would require a hearty steaming ladle-full of naivete to imagine that the general public now knows the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

The fact is that the Bush administration has aptly demonstrated that it simply cannot be trusted, and the sorry fact is that we can be certain of precious little beyond that.

The fact is, recognizing these facts does not constitute "fanaticism." I believe there's a saying down in Texas: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me -- you can't get fooled again."

This is working through the correct channels. They are not suing the Bush adminstration for constitutional violations, therefore congress does not need to be involved. They are suing AT&T for violating a federal law that is supposed to protect the privacy of their customers.

If the NSA has probable cause to get the phone records of a specific person, they can easily get a warrant in very little time. If they don't have probable cause, then they shouldn't be wasting their resources on that person.

And if you think the NSA's actions are prefectly legal, you need to read this.

If the monitoring of phone communications by the government is allowed, it definitely will be abused for political reasons. Neither republicans nor democrats have a squeaky clean record in terms of abuse of government security precautions. Since 9/11, many of the leaders of the lesser political parties have been flagged at airports as possible security risks. They weren't flagged because they were threatening, but because of their political positions.

If the president can't do his job without violating the rules of due process, he should step down and let somebody more competent do the job. The president's first priority should be to protect our freedoms. His second priority should be to keep us safe. Not the other way around.

Oh yeah, Brit Hume's just a paragon of journalism.

In addition, can we stop pretending the news needs to be "balanced"? Not every issue or event has "sides" and when they do they often don't have equal merit.

Hate to say it, but do you think US media really cares? Take a look at this article on fox media regarding iraq civil war.... I don't trust American media as far as I can throw it. It has to have certain tags {iraq, katrina, winter weather, dick cheney shooting} to have it picked up. I tend to look at BBC's news quite a bit, because it offers stories that aren't picked up by main stream US media.

You evidentally have no idea how your government works. If you can't get the votes because of the rules, you break them until you do. The party in power is the one controlling the agenda. It is the one that decides what issues get heard, how long they are heard, or even if they are heard.

B.

It would probably something for you to note that the wiretaps that occured with a person sitting on foreign soil (so even under your improper interpretation of an incomplete quote it would OK), if you actually read the report you'll see that it's from prior to Bush even being put into office, thirdly it would also be good to read what you quote because you are *WRONG*.

Let me provide you the proper quote of his 94 testimony that you wrongly interpreted, first two paragraphs complete with a link so you can look at the rest: http://thinkprogress.org/gorelick-testimony/

JAMIE S. GORELICK
JULY 14, 1994

You have asked for my views on the provision of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence's counterintelligence bill that establishes a procedure for court orders approving physical searches conducted in the United States for foreign intelligence purposes.

At the outset, let me emphasize two very important points. First, the Department of Justice believes, and the case law supports, that the President has inherent authority to conduct warrantless physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes and that the President may, as has been done, delegate this authority to the Attorney General.

Evidence of Carter or Clinton ordering a warrantless wiretap? Clinton called for allowing warrantless searches, but that isn't what he did. Show some facts.

If you are going to get into past presidents, lets talk about who gave weapons and money to terrorists in Iran and Nicaragua, hmm?

You're right. They hate our freedom and these are clearly terrorist acts. I don't think I even need to explain the link between them and 911, any idiot can see it.

We know they have weapons of mass destruction. We *KNOW* they have weapons of mass destruction. Freedom, freedom, stay the course, weapons of mass destruction. Freedom, freedom, stay the course, weapons of mass destruction.

Freedom, freedom, stay the course
Weapons of mass destruction

Bring 'em on!

Freedom, freedom, stay the course
Weapons of mass destruction

Fuck Greenland

Freedom, freedom, stay the course
Weapons of mass destruction

Fuck Greenland

Pussy, pansy motherfuckers
You know what you get
When you fuck with the red, the white, and the blue

We're coming to liberate you
We know who's responsible for 911
and it's fucking you

We're number one
We know what's best for you
We're coming to liberate you

Except that the reality is easy for anyone to see: you (attempt to) suppress sites dealing with politics, religion, dissent, and anything critical of the Chinese government or that doesn't support positions sanctioned by the Chinese government. The West and US don't do this (no matter how much our friendly, local conspiracy theorists might claim it).

The US doesn't have to censor information. It can just track who recieves it, and punish them when the time comes.

Erm, why do you take serious what Bush and Gonzales say, when they've been proved wrong so many times before? After all, Gonzales signed a document that said whatever you do to a prisoner isn't torture if the primary purpose is to gain information. The US government has a history of interning aborigines in concentration camps against legal rulings (the trail of tears). Doctors once endorsed leeches to draw out bad humors - why go to the hospital if you are sick?

Your argument about the ACLU is a weird non sequitur. Are you seriously arguing that this is the agenda of today's ACLU, or are you arguing that one (uncited) quote from decades ago by a "founder" discredits everything ever done by every member of that organization?

I thought I was taking the NYT reports "with a grain of salt" unless by "grain of salt" you mean "ignore the commie bastards". This is the paper that brought us Judy Miller and Whitewhater - skepticism about its articles is definitely called for. I think the jury's still out on whether there was purely domestic surveillance, and to how useful the program was. But even if the surveillance had one leg internationally, that doesn't necessarily make it legal to surveil US persons without a warrant.

The precedent argument is bunk - the cases were different in important legal aspects during the Carter and Clinton administrations. "Clinton did it!" is the last refuge of Republican scoundrels.

McClellan said the Clinton-Gore administration had engaged in warrantless physical searches, and he cited an FBI search of the home of CIA turncoat Aldrich Ames without permission from a judge. He said Clinton's deputy attorney general, Jamie Gorelick, had testified before Congress that the president had the inherent authority to engage in physical searches without warrants.

"I think his hypocrisy knows no bounds," McClellan said of Gore.

But at the time of the Ames search in 1993 and when Gorelick testified a year later, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act required warrants for electronic surveillance for intelligence purposes, but did not cover physical searches. The law was changed to cover physical searches in 1995 under legislation that Clinton supported and signed.

Bush's attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, made the same arguments as McClellan during interviews Monday on CNN's "Larry King Live" and Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes."

You may find this information interesting. http://thinkprogress.org/2005/12/20/drudge-fact-ch eck/

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/12/20/drudge-fact-ch eck/

Ahhh, OK, I get it now. The logic you're following from the Bush Administration is "if Clinton did it, it's OK."

Well, then, I guess we can expect the blow job to happen any time now. Oh, wait, that's right, this time WE, THE PEOPLE are getting FUCKED.

BTW, your points are taken from the WSJ opinion page, not the fact-based part of the paper. Nice try. It's a regurgitation of the same crap Drudge pulled out of his ass.

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/12/20/drudge-fact-ch eck/
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/12/21/8157/6595

I'd like to believe you value your civil liberties, but all you're doing is helping those who are taking them away. It's a shame. It also raises the question: If you don't value your civil liberties, why don't you leave America and go live somewhere else?

At the outset, let me emphasize two very important points. First, the Department of Justice believes, and the case law supports, that the President has inherent authority to conduct warrantless physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes and that the President may, as has been done, delegate this authority to the Attorney General.

Second, the Administration and the Attorney General support, in principle, legislation establishing judicial warrant procedures under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act for physical searches undertaken for intelligence purposes.

...the Department of Justice believes that Congress can legislate in the area of physical searches as it has done with respect to electronic surveillances, and we are prepared to support appropriate legislation.

but torture most certainly does provide reliable information in certain situations. If you are looking for specific verifiable information (where is the bomb planted) and the person knows, torture will get that information from them.

Military interrogators say otherwise.

If the bomb is ticking, the bomber will just give you false information. Yes, it's verifiable information, so you know he lied when it blows up across town as your bomb squad converges on the false leads he gave you, but so what?

Carter and Clinton signed Executive Orders that demanded authorities explicitly comply within the provisions of FISA! Bush's orders have bypassed FISA entirely. Why do you think even many conservative Republican politicians are outraged at Bush? Why did a FISA judge resign in protest of this decision?

Read this piece on Think Progress for more information on how what Bush did went FAR BEYOND the orders signed by Clinton and Carter. Clinton and Carter complied with FISA, Bush violated it extraordinarily.

You made these same claims a few days ago, and they are utter Bullshit! The executive orders signed by Clinton and Carter specifically reference FISA and that authorities granted by those orders are required to abide by FISA!. Bush has bypassed FISA directly. There is no comparison whatsoever between the two cases.

Think Progress has a nice explanation of this, and how Bush went FAR BEYOND anything that any President of the US has done before.

And that begs the question, why do you think so many conservative Republicans are outraged if Clinton had merely done the same thing?

And finally, one last question to demonstrate the right-wing's hypocrisy - if you support Bush spying on Americans without court orders, including non-terror persons like vegans, Would you not mind if Hillary Clinton used the same authority to spy on NRA members, anti-abortion activists, intelligent-design advocates, and anti-gay-marriage people?

Do you see the difference?

There's however a big difference between Bush's usage and Carter's/Regaan's/Clinton's: Carter/Regan/Clinton required that the attorney general certify that the warrantless search would meet FISA requirements .
Bush's usage does not require this certification and is therefore illegal.

<quote>
Section 1. Pursuant to section 302(a)(1) [50 U.S.C. 1822(a)] of the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance] Act, the Attorney General is authorized to approve physical searches, without a court order, to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year, if the Attorney General makes the certifications required by that section.
</quote>

Here are the real facts which show that Clinton always complied with the law and got the necessary warrants.

Drudge want's to cloud the issue by making Bush's behavior look common. It most certainly is not. Bush bypassed even the after-the-fact warrant and conducted spying on US citizens without any court oversight whatsoever. This is an impeachable offense and Bush should be removed from office as quickly as the law permits.

Drudge was lying. Here are the real facts which show that Clinton always complied with the law and got the necessary warrants.

Drudge want's to cloud the issue by making Bush's behavior look common. It most certainly is not. Bush bypassed even the after-the-fact warrant and conducted spying on US citizens without any court oversight whatsoever. This is an impeachable offense and Bush should be removed from office as quickly as the law permits.

Nice try at repeating a Matt Drudge lie. Matt Drudge chopped sentences off at mid-word to completely reverse the actual context of what was in those Carter and Clinton executive orders...

From judd at the think progress blog...

"Fact Check: Clinton/Carter Executive Orders Did Not Authorize Warrantless Searches of Americans

The top of the Drudge Report claims "CLINTON EXECUTIVE ORDER: SECRET SEARCH ON AMERICANS WITHOUT COURT ORDER..." It's not true. Here's the breakdown -

What Drudge says:

        Clinton, February 9, 1995: "The Attorney General is authorized to approve physical searches, without a court order"

What Clinton actually signed:

        Section 1. Pursuant to section 302(a)(1) [50 U.S.C. 1822(a)] of the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance] Act, the Attorney General is authorized to approve physical searches, without a court order, to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year, if the Attorney General makes the certifications required by that section.

That section requires the Attorney General to certify is the search will not involve "the premises, information, material, or property of a United States person." That means U.S. citizens or anyone inside of the United States.

The entire controversy about Bush's program is that, for the first time ever, allows warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens and other people inside of the United States. Clinton's 1995 executive order did not authorize that.

Drudge pulls the same trick with Carter.

What Drudge says:

        Jimmy Carter Signed Executive Order on May 23, 1979: "Attorney General is authorized to approve electronic surveillance to acquire foreign intelligence information without a court order."

What Carter's executive order actually says:

        1-101. Pursuant to Section 102(a)(1) of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1802(a)), the Attorney General is authorized to approve electronic surveillance to acquire foreign intelligence information without a court order, but only if the Attorney General makes the certifications required by that Section.

What the Attorney General has to certify under that section is that the surveillance will not contain "the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party." So again, no U.S. persons are involved."

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/12/20/drudge-fact-ch eck/

I take responsibilty for posting a huge chunk of Judd's post at Think Progress. I think he'll understand how important getting this fact check on these lies around is. It's getting really old dealing with neo-con lies. Thank Gawd their days are clearly numbered.

than I can give is over here at Think Progress.

transcript? i'll do you better.

here's the video of his remarks