Senate Intelligence Committee is "In The Bag"

President Bush apparently has any Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into the extra-legal NSA warrantless eavesdropping program "in the bag."

The chairman of the committee, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) has declared, before any hearings on the matter, that no law was broken. It looks like the fix is in.

Roberts said Friday the Bush administration's domestic spying is within the president's inherent power under the Constitution, and he rejected criticism that Congress was kept in the dark about it.

The program is "legal, necessary and reasonable," the Kansas Republican wrote in a 19-page letter, taking a particularly expansive view of the president's authority for the warrantless surveillance.

"Congress, by statute, cannot extinguish a core constitutional authority of the president," Roberts wrote.

Presidents from George Washington to George W. Bush have intercepted communications to ascertain enemy threats to national security, Roberts told the chairman and ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Roberts' letter came just three days before that panel was to question Attorney General Alberto Gonzales about the surveillance.

Pointing to others who have broken laws and then claiming that this means that there is no law on the books is the current gooper talking point on the issue. It's like a speeding motorist telling the cop that has just stopped him "those 42 cars in front of me were speeding too, that makes the law invalid."

The officer would say to the motorist the same thing that Americans will soon be telling "Mister Danger" and the rest of his administration.

"Tell it to the judge!"

It is hopefulness bordering on the Pollyanna-ish to think that the Senate Judiciary Committee will be much harder on the crooked administration when they begin hearings on Monday.

That is because the average motorist does not have the judiciary up to and including the Supreme Court in his or her pocket.