Shizam....Is the Wiretapping issue is GONE...dead....deceased....

[spanone]

Ever notice how this Bushit administration has one scandal wiped off the map as another one arrives???
Abramoff gave way to wiretapping gave way to Cheneyshoot gave way to portgate and on and on and on....

[Skidmore]

1. It'll be back.

Reserve your Shizams for another day.

[spanone]

2. There you go! Shizam you answered my questions...all worries gone.

[Vinca]

3. Lately it seems like another week, another scandal.

Nothing ever goes away, though. Someday Fitzy will emerge again, Abramoff will be back, the spying scandal will be back when Congress reconvenes. It's all there . . . just moved to the background for today.

[Javaman]

17. It's the scandal conga line...one right after another! n/t

[stevietheman]

18. Yep, and Katrina aftermath keeps popping up thru the haze too. n/t

n/t

[OldLeftieLawyer]

4. It's gone

Maybe it'll emerge as some sort of ancillary issue somewhere down the line, but, no, it's gone for good, I believe.

When there's no investigation - thanks, Congress - there's nothing.

We have to hope that the lawsuits filed by individuals who believed they were spied upon will hold, but I'm not optimistic about that avenue.

[spanone]

14. Important issue...as the prez said THIS IS GOING ON AS WE SPEAK

He vowed to keep doing it so one can only imagine that he NSA is busy at work...

[CottonBear]

5. JAQFOBS: Just Another Quickly Forgotten Outrageous Bush Scandal

Thanks to Duer calmblueocean for coming up with this acronym yesterday.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=490497&mesg_id=490524
JAQFOBS: Just Another Quickly Forgotten Outrageous Bush Scandal

[BOSSHOG]

6. While some of those stories are off page one

they are still very much alive, especially the one's with lawyers and investigators involved: Plame, jackamoff, wiretaps. They aren't going away. We should be thankful the alcoholic deserter in the white house gives us such a variety of garbage to wade through. Garbage which will be the basis for his legacy. And we can just imagine what will be on the front page next month as the circus continues to run its course.

[Warren Stupidity]

7. It was pretty obvious that the strategy for containment

was to hold a sham hearing, pronounce 'nothing of interest here' and give the Imperial Presiduncy carte blech to do whatever it wants, laws and constitution be damned.

As Congress has abdicated, only a court case can bring this issue back.

[hlthe2b]

8. this port deal has similar ramifications (ignoring Congress)

to the wiretap issue. I think it will stimulate round 2 soon.

[spanone]

16. God, I hope you're right. If Congress wishes if could investigate forever

they could have these scandals in holding patterns...bringing in one after another...next!

[formercia]

9. Hey!, look over there! n/t

[thecrow]

10. Dizzying, isn't it?

I think as the scandals grow more and more serious, we are being inured to it all; kind of like daily battle fatigue.
It gets to the point where you don't even want to know, sometimes.
They break the law, domestically, internationally, constitutionally, and we're getting to the point as a nation of just turning away from it.
However, I think that Katrina really sunk him, so now * thinks he can pull out the really batshit crazy stuff, thinking nobody is interested.

*I* read about the ports deal a couple weeks ago and thought, "They are going to slip this one on us in the shadow of these other scandals..."
and I suppose they thought they could. Having the Smirk say that he "just found out about it ... after the deal was made..." is NO EXCUSE.

Without the internet, we would just be reading this in state-run newspapers.
I'm SO THANKFUL for DU; discussing issues; researching for the truth in all this. Otherwise, my head would have exploded long ago.

[enough]

11. NSA scandal and Portgate - a perfect match: Glenn Greenwald

Here's one place where the scandals do not cancel each other out. Greenwald is keeping the NSA scandal front and center.

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/

snip>

.....the serious split between the Administration and their formerly compliant Congressional allies is, for many reasons, the perfect framework in which to press for real Congressional investigations into the NSA scandal. The emergence of this sharp wedge between the Congress and White House, as well as the distrust of the White House which the port controversy is generating, create the ideal groundwork for agitating for Congressional investigations.

The principal argument which has been invoked by the President's apologists for suppressing investigations -- namely, that we should blindly trust the President on national security matters and that Congress has no business investigating the President's decisions concerning the "war on terror"-- is entirely obviated by the port controversy. In response to demands for an NSA investigation, it will now ring intuitively false for any Republican Senator to claim that Congress has no role to play, or that the Administration should be trusted with no oversight, when it comes to making decisions about how to defend the nation.

After all, the spectacle playing out in front of everyone's eyes is precisely the opposite -- namely, Congressional Republicans are insisting that they need to intervene in the decision-making process of who will control our ports precisely because the Administration has exercised such poor judgment and cannot be trusted to operate without Congressional oversight. In many ways, this conflict between Congressional Republicans and the Administration is the perfectly constructed antidote for the noxious excuse we've been hearing (from Pat Roberts, among others) that Congress should not bother the White House about any decisions which the President makes relating to defense of the country.

Beyond that specific point, this port controversy represents yet another instance where the Administration expressed its transparent contempt for the notion that Congress has any real role to play in our system of Government other than giving symbolic endorsement to the dictates of the President.

much more>

[midnight]

12. ACLU is in the process of suing NSA

So someone is working on our behave to have these actions stopped. But you are right. There should be a much chatter going on about this. And the investigation should be lead by congress. I think they are on vacation. If so, that would be two vactions they have taken since this hit the public's attention.

[KharmaTrain]

13. They Said The Same About Plame

Call it "scandal overload"...too much shit piling up too high. Every week we get a new "gift". One week Crashcart bags a Repugnican lawyer this week it's fukstick turning the national security of 8 ports over to the UAE. This stuff is just too good to let pass and in our short-attention span culture, these stories "sizzle"...glow hot and then fade. The NSA story is a different animal.

Sooner, rather than later, more information about this program will come forward. Also, there are and will be court challenges. Sorry this story doesn't have the "sexy sizzle" you'd like it to have, but as Ferris Bueler said "live moves fast".

Cheers...

[FlaGranny]

15. That's the plan.

Outrage after outrage, coming so fast there is no time to take in any of them or do anything about them. Overwhelm the brain. Confuse with sheer volume of outrages.

[The_Casual_Observer]

19. I have my doubts that the program ever worked in the first place.

The "big secret" is that none of that NSA stuff has any value at all to anyone.