The Madness of King George (& Co.)

Sen. Barbara Boxer has written to four presidential scholars, asking them if President Bush has committed an impeachable offense by engaging in electronic surveillance of American citizens without getting a warrant from a judge. The president's reaction?

"My personal opinion is it was a shameful act for someone to disclose this very important program in a time of war," Bush said at a press conference on Monday. "The fact that we're discussing this program is helping the enemy."

You might be wondering why Sen. Boxer didn't send her inquiry to our attorney general rather than to a group of scholars. Probably because our attorney general is a useless tool:

Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez rejected the notion that "the United States is somehow spying on American citizens. What we're trying to do is learn of communications, back and forth, from within the United States to overseas with members of al Qaeda," he said.

Surely there's someone in Bush's administration who still believes in good old "checks and balances". However, that someone is absolutely not Vice President Dick Cheney

"I believe in a strong, robust executive authority and I think that the world we live in demands it," Cheney said. "I would argue that the actions that we've taken are totally appropriate and consistent with the constitutional authority of the president... It's not an accident that we haven't been hit in four years."

The stories I've quoted are here and here.