, then the entire domestic spying program and all of its participants are 100 percent immune from any judicial and/or congressional oversight.
Which is why I had to give a bitter, jaded laugh when the news this morning was all about the Iranian dissident Ramin Jahanbegloo being picked up by his government and held without charge--eliciting much hand-wringing on this side of the Atlantic. He's being held without charge in an undisclosed location and is accused of having “relations with foreigners,” engaging in espionage, and of crimes against security. Sound familiar? It's what our president thinks he'd like to do to dissidents potential terrorists or their fellow travelers in this country. For relations with foreigners, just read relations with terrorists; for crimes against security, well, that one is obvious. Undisclosed locations? check! held without charges? check! So...there you have it.