George W. Bush has betrayed the oath of his office, violated the Constitution of the United States, and broken the laws of the land.
Warrant-less wiretapping of United States citizens is illegal under the United States Constitution. There is no amount of stretching of the President’s power that can expand it so far as to contravene the Constitution of the United States. As the Honorable Judge Anna Diggs Taylor points out in her recent opinion outlining the illegality of Bush’s warrantless wiretapping, it is the same Constitution which grants the President his power that contains the Forth Amendment. In establishing and continuing the illegal wiretapping of American citizens, the President of the United States have broken the laws of the Congress and violated the United States Constitution. He is a criminal.
There are no circumstances, however exigent, that revoke the rights, liberties, and protections of the United States Constitution. The war on terror is meaningless – a complete sham, a craven mockery – if it attempts to compromise that which it purports to defend.
Republican’s and others may say that the innocent have nothing to worry about, or that objecting to the impugning of the Constitution is un-American in a time of war, and aids and comforts America’s enemies. They are the true cowards. There is nothing more precious than our freedoms. Our freedoms are the only things worth fight for.
It takes strong, brave people to live free. A government that must illegally listen in on the private conversations of its citizens, or hold suspects without trial for fear that the charges against them can not stand when openly contested, is a weak government.
Now the Republicans are going to say that if George doesn’t get his way in being able to violate the rights of American citizens, then the war on terror is jeopardized. If the government has to violate the rights of American’s and George has to subvert the will of the Congress and the Constitution to hunt down the terrorists, then the terrorists have indeed won.
We can not make ourselves more secure by making ourselves less free. It is our freedom and liberty – our right to be free from the intrusion of the government in our homes, and in our speech, and our associations – which are what make our country worth defending. By sacrificing our freedoms on the alter of his failed war on terror, Bush has raped the Constitution and given the finger to the founding fathers and all those who have ever fought to enlarge our freedoms rather than diminish them.
