More overreach

By Creature

I know I would be a bad blogger if I didn't comment on the latest revelation of Bush administration overreach into our private lives, but I'm just finding it hard to find the words, or the outrage, this time around. By now you all know the details: 9/11 happened and Dick Cheney took it upon himself to turn the world upside down and inside out (war, illegal surveillance, you name it). Or, more specifically, he used 9/11, as the BooMan reminds us, "to take us back to a pre-Watergate situation where the intelligence agencies do whatever they want and Congress need not know boo about it." Fine, I'll be even more specific, this from today's NYT:

WASHINGTON, June 22 — Under a secret Bush administration program initiated weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, counterterrorism officials have gained access to financial records from a vast international database and examined banking transactions involving thousands of Americans and others in the United States, according to government and industry officials.

Whatever. Mind you, if I trusted the Bushes to stay within the law I would have no problem with this, but time and time again they have proven that the temptation to circumvent the law is just too great for them. Again, 9/11 was Cheney's wet dream, a gift with a bow on top that just keeps on giving. And why do I put all this law circumvention on his shoulders? Watch Frontline's The Dark Side, and then tell me it's not all about Dick.

Plus, I would also be remiss if I didn't mention the story behind the story. That being the Bush administration and the Right-wing nut-o-sphere having a conniption over the fact that the press ran with this story in the first place. It's a matter of national security, you know. Well, I do know, and you know what? The terrorists know too, and they knew before this morning that their money transfers were being monitored, so please get off your high national security horse already. And, if you're going to go nuts over the Times, then go nuts over the Wall Street Journal as well.

My fellow bloggers have more. Please stop by War and Piece, Shakespeare's Sister, Hullabaloo, The Heretik and Taylor Marsh.

(Cross-posted at State of the Day.)