Note to Idahoans: Check Spuds For Bugs.

A special thanks to those 57 Democrats in Congress who joined their Republican comrades in voting for the PAA, Protect America Act (I prefer the Propagandized Ass [donkey] Act), which in essence allows Bushco to say to American citizens, “Your donkey is ours.”

Warrantless eavesdropping is only one of many covert programs aimed at Americans since 2001, in spite of the supposedly prevailing Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Attorney Glenn Greenwald said, “...James Comey testified before the Senate that he and Ashcroft and others had discovered that whatever it was that they were doing from 2001 to 2004 was so illegal, so unconscionable, that they had all decided to resign en masse from the government unless that behavior ceased immediately.”

Congress still doesn’t know what triggered their alarm.

Greenwald said that what we do know, “... is not because we have an establishment press that has investigated and uncovered it, and it’s certainly not because we have a congress that has exercised oversight, it’s because there are... honorable and noble whistleblowers inside the government, who have ... disclosed the fact that the government is breaking the law.”

As for the PAA, on August 10 John Dean wrote, “Congress was not even certain about the full extent of what it has authorized because President Bush and Vice-President Cheney refused to reveal it.”

The act places the power into the hands of Al-for-Alzheimer’s Gonzales and the director of intelligence, who can order communication service companies to create spying posts for the government and grant immunity for any illegal activity by those who participate.

Although there is a 6-month sunset for the act, the programs it authorizes can operate for up to 1 year.

Come Thanksgiving, somehow a traditional turkey dinner will seem inappropriate. We’re having cooked goose.

Stan Metcalf
Gooding