Republican Who Oversees N.S.A. Calls for Wiretap Inquiry

I have seen this woman in hearings before and I knew I liked her for some reason. Maybe it is because she has a soul and a conscious. Unusual for D.C. these days. Maybe she is a patriot. Also unusual for D.C. these days. She certainly sounds like a true patriot to me.

 

If one feels so inclined, it might be good to send her an email of support, or give her office a call

 

It seems that this is what it is all coming down to, and this issue (NSA domestic spying) is bringing it to a head, now:

 

Do we still have our Constitutionally-limited,  Democratic Republic or don't we?

 

If there is no balance of power, the answer is no. If Congress cannot or will not investigate, in all honesty, the  actions of this White House, we do not have anything resembling a Democracy or a Republic. We have an imperial presidency, and that is not the government of America.

 

The second question is, does anyone care, and what are we going to do about it?  

 

By ERIC LICHTBLAU

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 — A House Republican whose subcommittee oversees the National Security Agency broke ranks with the White House on Tuesday and called for a full Congressional inquiry into the Bush administration's domestic eavesdropping program.

The lawmaker, Representative Heather A. Wilson of New Mexico, chairwoman of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence, said in an interview that she had "serious concerns" about the surveillance program. By withholding information about its operations from many lawmakers, she said, the administration has deepened her apprehension about whom the agency is monitoring and why.

Ms. Wilson, who was a National Security Council aide in the administration of President Bush's father, is the first Republican on either the House's Intelligence Committee or the Senate's to call for a full Congressional investigation into the program, in which the N.S.A. has been eavesdropping without warrants on the international communications of people inside the United States believed to have links with terrorists.

The congresswoman's discomfort with the operation appears to reflect deepening fissures among Republicans over the program's legal basis and political liabilities. Many Republicans have strongly backed President Bush's power to use every tool at his disposal to fight terrorism, but 4 of the 10 Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee voiced concerns about the program at a hearing where Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales testified on Monday.

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