What are you Wearing?

Abu Gonzalez is scheduled to go before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday to talk about his boss' penchant for listening in on our phone calls. He's expected to compare Bush's actions to Lincoln's during the Civil War, when telegraph messages were routinely intercepted. This, of course is absurd. Regardless of the legality of Lincoln's actions, comparing the Civil War to the "War on Terror" is a little like comparing the Cold War to the movie Red Dawn; one was a very real threat to the security of our nation, the other, a heavily marketed piece of fiction. Moreover, while Bush can't be expected to remember the history covered while he was doing keg stands in high school, Gonzalez should remember that the people Lincoln was wiretapping were from the southern states that had succeeded, so they didn't consider themselves to be, you know, citizens.

Let's not expect this line of reasoning to provoke any soul searching on Pennsylvania Avenue, though. After all, these are the same people who tell us that, had the President been wiretapping us all before 9/11, he may have caught the hijackers, because the Presidential Daily Briefing, entitled, Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside US, didn't really get us where we needed to be in terms of putting 2 and 2 together.

I know there are lots of important questions about this, like what's so hard about getting a warrant if these guys are burning their anytime minutes talking about blowing us all up? But I guess the question I have is more basic: How many terrorists have been arrested because of this program? I mean, that's what it's all about, isn't it? Last time I checked, the only people we've prosecuted on terrorism charges in the US are that Padilla guy, the dirty bomber (he loved his porn), and Moussaoui, the so-called 20th Hijacker, and I don't think they would have had a problem getting a warrant against either of those guys. So, I guess my point is, if this program is so necessary and vital, why haven't we caught anyone with it? Could it be that in addition to being "necessary" and "vital", it also
"doesn't work"?