Constitutional Cuckolds

Imagine opening an e-mail from a well-meaning friend who has written to tell you that your spouse is being unfaithful to you. Your friend, acting on certain suspicions, has gathered evidence proving that your loved one is meeting with a third party every day, Monday through Friday, to carry out a torrid affair.

When you confront your mate, the allegation is met with an angry denial. You are accused of being paranoid and insecure. The denial is unconvincing.

After further discussion, your unfaithful partner eventually admits to the infidelity. However, the admission is followed not with an apology, but with a declaration that the affair will continue as it has. Your spouse loves the other person, you see. You have no right to interfere with their love.

You protest. You threaten divorce. Your spouse offers you a compromise. The affair will no longer take place every Monday through Friday. Your husband or wife will see their lover every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for one hour each, or every Tuesday and Thursday for 90 minutes at a time. You can choose which one you would prefer.

Would you consider this a compromise, or a complete surrender?

This is the question facing Sen. Arlen Specter and his fellow lawmakers, as the Bush administration says that it might be willing to submit its illegal domestic surveillance program to congressional and judicial supervision.

The White House and key congressional committees have begun crafting legislation that would try to overcome legal objections to the Bush administration's controversial domestic surveillance program and subject it to review by a secret intelligence court, government officials said yesterday.

Administration lawyers still maintain that President Bush has the authority to eavesdrop on domestic telephone calls between Americans and suspected terrorists overseas without the approval of a court, his aides said yesterday. But the closed-door negotiations marked a new willingness on the part of national security officials to accept congressional oversight of domestic surveillance.

[...]
The new discussions between the White House and Congress were prompted by exchanges between Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Vice President Dick Cheney in recent weeks.

Specter, who has been among the fiercest critics of the domestic spying activities, yesterday said on ``Fox News Sunday" that ``we're getting close with the discussions with the White House, I think, to having the wiretapping issue submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court."

He added, ``After the vice president and I exchanged some letters, he said he was serious about discussions, we've had discussions, and I've talked to ranking officials in the White House."

Specter is pathetic in his attempts to reassert his constitutional authority over the outlaw presidency of George W. Bush. He presents a spectacle as painful to behold as that of a man whose wife is carrying on an affair in full view of their family and friends.

The constitution of the United States requires the president to obey the law. This is not in dispute with regards to domestic surveillance of American citizens, or anything else. The Bush administration's radical assertions of executive authority to break the law are quite open to dispute. Yet, congress is actually negotiating with Bush over the terms of his willingness to comply with the law. This means Bush has won. The only thing being negotiated here are the terms of congress' surrender.

If man with a gun demands all of your money, and you get him to agree to take only half, you have still been robbed. You can argue that it was better than losing all of your money, and that it was better than getting shot, but you have still been robbed. Some people can live with that. Others can't.

I would prefer that congress force President Bush to obey the law, period, no IFs, ANDs or BUTs.

Obviously, Arlen Specter doesn't mind getting robbed, and has no problem with a wife who only sleeps around on him three days a week.