TURNING UP THE HEAT. To follow up on Ezra�s points, let me add that President George W. Bush came out with both barrels blazin', demanding that Congress pass his two bills -- one sanctioning the sort of tribunals the administration wants to use for adjudicating the cases of the "enemy combatants." One can't help but wonder why he's pushing so hard and so indignantly against the likes of Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-Va.), and Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham. On the second bill, George Washington University Law School Professor Jonathan Turley has repeatedly explained why the president wants the Specter version of the surveillance bill to pass: Without it, Turley says, Bush could be revealed to have broken federal law some 30 times in his domestic spying program. When a reporter posed a question about what he called the "eavesdropping program," Bush corrected him, saying, "We call that the 'Terrorist Surveillance Program,' Hutch." Later in the press conference, Bush again mentioned the 'Terrorist Surveillance Program,' and then, snickering, asked something along the lines of: "Or, what was it that you called it? The Illegal Eavesdropping Program? IEP instead of TSP?" Yes, actually, Mr. President, that's what I would call it.
--Adele M. Stan
