There remain strong grounds for suspicion that the president was serving no national good, but only hijacking power that the Framers of the Constitution expressly sought to deny him. And it does not help allay our concerns that this conducting of warrantless searches fits into "a pattern of disregard" for legal restraints, both domestic and international. But if the president has a good justification, let us hear it.
In any event, why isn't President Bush being pressed to provide justification, and why isn't the evidence being explored publicly with the same intensity that was devoted to the Lewinsky affair?
The Most Vital of National Interests
The moral character of the president in his private life does matter. As the most prominent personal embodiment of the nation, the president inevitably is a kind of role model. So President Clinton's dalliance was not altogether irrelevant to his fulfillment of his job as president.
But the suspicions about President Bush's violating his oath to protect the Constitution relate to the very core of his presidential responsibilities.
As the oath makes clear, the Constitution is the heart and soul of America. It is the inner sanctum that our public servants swear to protect; the great gift that our soldiers have fought and died for, the very foundation of our national identity. Even while we Americans divide on many issues, the sanctity of the Constitution is what unites us. It is our core assertion to the world that "we are a nation of laws, not of men."
In this context, what could matter more than whether the President of the United States is honoring his oath of office, or whether he is treating the Constitution as an obstacle to be casually, needlessly swept aside?
Our Founding Fathers certainly would have known that this is an absolutely major story. The system of checks and balances was not a casual thing. It was a profound vision they had into meeting the challenge of how to avoid tyranny. And, as human history shows, the avoidance of tyranny is no small accomplishment. Free and decent societies have been few.
The fourth amendment protection against "unreasonable search and seizure" represented the Founding Fathers' understanding, based on the millennia of human history in which they were schooled, of the tools of tyranny. If the King does not need the approval of the Judge to invade the privacy of the citizen, freedom is imperiled. So "We the People" determined that the court would serve as a check and a balance against the potentially tyrannical power of the executive.
If there was no imperative need for President Bush to conduct searches without first getting a warrant, then why did he do it? Would he grab a tyrant's powers if he didn't have a tyrant's intentions?
We urgently need an independent investigation to discover just what purposes were being served by these warrantless wiretaps. Was this monitoring confined to those people who might reasonably be suspected of being a terrorist threat to America? Or were people perhaps chosen as targets for surveillance simply because they were political opponents of this president and his policies?
What could be more important than to know whether the great achievement of our Founding Fathers is being dismantled? But one would hardly know anything of such vital importance was at stake from watching how our mainstream media are dealing with this possible constitutional crisis.
What Master Are the Media Serving?
Is the reason for the media's casualness in treating this administration's possible running roughshod over the Constitution that the media don't think this story will grab an audience the way, say, stains on a blue dress did?
But how would they know?
Watergate certainly transfixed the nation thirty-some years ago.
In any event, why isn't President Bush being pressed to provide justification, and why isn't the evidence being explored publicly with the same intensity that was devoted to the Lewinsky affair?
The Most Vital of National Interests
The moral character of the president in his private life does matter. As the most prominent personal embodiment of the nation, the president inevitably is a kind of role model. So President Clinton's dalliance was not altogether irrelevant to his fulfillment of his job as president.
As the oath makes clear, the Constitution is the heart and soul of America. It is the inner sanctum that our public servants swear to protect; the great gift that our soldiers have fought and died for, the very foundation of our national identity. Even while we Americans divide on many issues, the sanctity of the Constitution is what unites us. It is our core assertion to the world that "we are a nation of laws, not of men."
In this context, what could matter more than whether the President of the United States is honoring his oath of office, or whether he is treating the Constitution as an obstacle to be casually, needlessly swept aside?
Our Founding Fathers certainly would have known that this is an absolutely major story. The system of checks and balances was not a casual thing. It was a profound vision they had into meeting the challenge of how to avoid tyranny. And, as human history shows, the avoidance of tyranny is no small accomplishment. Free and decent societies have been few.
The fourth amendment protection against "unreasonable search and seizure" represented the Founding Fathers' understanding, based on the millennia of human history in which they were schooled, of the tools of tyranny. If the King does not need the approval of the Judge to invade the privacy of the citizen, freedom is imperiled. So "We the People" determined that the court would serve as a check and a balance against the potentially tyrannical power of the executive.
If there was no imperative need for President Bush to conduct searches without first getting a warrant, then why did he do it? Would he grab a tyrant's powers if he didn't have a tyrant's intentions?
We urgently need an independent investigation to discover just what purposes were being served by these warrantless wiretaps. Was this monitoring confined to those people who might reasonably be suspected of being a terrorist threat to America? Or were people perhaps chosen as targets for surveillance simply because they were political opponents of this president and his policies?
What could be more important than to know whether the great achievement of our Founding Fathers is being dismantled? But one would hardly know anything of such vital importance was at stake from watching how our mainstream media are dealing with this possible constitutional crisis.
What Master Are the Media Serving?
Is the reason for the media's casualness in treating this administration's possible running roughshod over the Constitution that the media don't think this story will grab an audience the way, say, stains on a blue dress did?
But how would they know?
Watergate certainly transfixed the nation thirty-some years ago.
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