WaPo Corrects Bush on SOTU:

[Coexist]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/01/AR2006020100029.html

Assertions on Spying, Jobs And Spending Invite Debate:
<snip>
(On 9/11 being preventable if they had been wiretapping): But the Sept. 11 commission and congressional investigators said the government had compiled significant information on the two suspects before the attacks and that bureaucratic problems -- not a lack of information -- were the main reasons for the security breakdown. The FBI did not even know where the two suspects lived and missed numerous opportunities to track them down in the 20 months before the attacks.

<snip>
At another point, Bush said the number of jobs went up by 4.6 million in the past two and half years. There was a reason he chose not to start from the beginning of his presidency -- that would have brought the net number of added jobs down to 2 million over the five-year period.

<snip>
Bush also made a pair of contradictory pledges on the budget. He said the budget deficit -- which has soared during his presidency -- is on track to decline by half by 2009. But he also urged a permanent extension of his tax cuts, due to expire in five years. The Congressional Budget Office says this would send the budget deficit soaring after 2011.

<snip>
Bush made a plea for cutting imports of oil, saying it is "often imported from unstable parts of the world." But the two biggest suppliers of oil to the United States are very stable neighbors -- Canada and Mexico. Only three of the 10 biggest suppliers are from the Middle East -- Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Algeria.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. They could summarize it this way:

Bush is a lying, incompetent idiot.

[Coexist]

3. LOL - but his was more eloquent.

Yours was quicker and more to the point - maybe he should have just written that - so he didn't seem like an "elitist".

[stop the bleeding]

2. WOW - I feel like I just read some of DU's debunking of *'s points

but this is from the WAPO not DU. Can't believe they are actually calling him out on this.

Had to rub my eyes

[helderheid]

4. weren't they also illegally spying before 9/11?

[Coexist]

5. if they were- I haven't heard about it

maybe it was Karl Rove compiling dossiers on his enemies list.

[helderheid]

7. Found it

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011306Z.shtml

Bush Authorized Domestic Spying Before 9/11
By Jason Leopold
t r u t h o u t | Perspective

Friday 13 January 2006

The National Security Agency advised President Bush in early 2001 that it had been eavesdropping on Americans during the course of its work monitoring suspected terrorists and foreigners believed to have ties to terrorist groups, according to a declassified document.

The NSA's vast data-mining activities began shortly after Bush was sworn in as president and the document contradicts his assertion that the 9/11 attacks prompted him to take the unprecedented step of signing a secret executive order authorizing the NSA to monitor a select number of American citizens thought to have ties to terrorist groups.

In its "Transition 2001" report, the NSA said that the ever-changing world of global communication means that "American communication and targeted adversary communication will coexist."

"Make no mistake, NSA can and will perform its missions consistent with the Fourth Amendment and all applicable laws," the document says.

However, it adds that "senior leadership must understand that the NSA's mission will demand a 'powerful, permanent presence' on global telecommunications networks that host both 'protected' communications of Americans and the communications of adversaries the agency wants to target."

<snip>

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011306Z.shtml

[Coexist]

9. thanks - I would be interested to know...

they get a memo entitled "Al queda determined to strike in the U.S.", are told that a terrorist attack to NY or DC is one of the top 3 things to worry about - and do nothing. But are doing warrantless wiretaps???

[Coexist]

10. Wow - you're good. Thanks.

I didn't even get my reply out before you were back.

Do they EVER tell the truth or is it always opposite day?

[helderheid]

12. Orwellian!!

[Coexist]

13. Too funny. n/t

[stop the bleeding]

11. It has been amazing to me that this article did not recieve more attention

in the MSM

[leftstreet]

6. Looks like WaPo should have done the SOTU rebuttal n/t

[DeepModem Mom]

8. ALSO LAT -- long article posted here, in LBN --

Bush Stretches to Defend Surveillance
The president's justification for his spy program has disputable roots, as do some of the facts and figures he put forth in his speech.
By Peter Wallsten and Maura Reynolds, Times Staff Writers

WASHINGTON — President Bush received a roaring ovation Tuesday for his prime-time defense of wiretapping phone calls without warrants. But Bush's explanation relied on assumptions that have been widely questioned by experts who say the president offers a debatable interpretation of history.

Defending the surveillance program as crucial in a time of war, Bush said that "previous presidents have used the same constitutional authority" that he did. "And," he added, "federal courts have approved the use of that authority."

Bush did not name names, but was apparently reiterating the argument offered earlier this month by Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales, who invoked Presidents Lincoln, Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt for their use of executive authority.

However, warrantless surveillance within the United States for national security purposes was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972 — long after Lincoln, Wilson and Roosevelt stopped issuing orders. That led to the 1978 passage of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that Bush essentially bypassed in authorizing the program after the Sept. 11 attacks....

***

Bush's historical reference on domestic spying marked one of several points in his speech in which he backed up assertions with selective uses of fact, or seemed to place a positive spin on his own interpretation....

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