Aug. 10, 2007 (LPAC)--Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) made a scathing attack on the White House for its "manipulation" of facts to bully Congress into legalizing illegal wiretaps. The Feingold statements are among further details of how the White House -- doubtless under Dick Cheney's direction -- bullied Congress into giving it vastly expanded legal authority to carry out surveillance of Americans' phone calls and e-mails, that described by the New York Times today.

"There was an intentional manipulation of the facts to get this through," Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc) told the New York Times in an interview. Feingold added that the White House "has identified the one remaining weakness in the Democratic Party, and that's its unwillingness to stand up to the Administration when it's making a power grab regarding terrorism and national security."

"They have figured out that all they have to do is start talking about an imminent terrorist threat, back it up against a Congressional recess, and they know the Democrats will cave," Feingold said.

A month or so after a decision by the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court in February or March, restricting the NSA's ability to intercept foreign-to-foreign communications which pass through telecommunications hubs in the U.S., Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Mike McConnell began discussing an "intelligence gap" with lawmakers. At the same time, the White House proposed sweeping new measures to "modernize" FISA. But Congress was in no mood to consider any broad measures until it was briefed on a post-9/11 program on surveillance, which had come to light in December 2005. Neither was Congress about to give any new powers to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

In mid-July, the White House began increasing the pressure on Congress, and cut its original 66-page proposal to 11 pages. A sticking point was still that the White House wanted Gonzales and the DNI to approve the surveillance, and Democratic leaders wanted supervision by the FISA court -- which McConnell had agreed to.

But on Friday, Aug. 3, the White House forced McConnell to back down. With time running out before the recess, the Senate approved a bill that omitted stronger court oversight, and the House approved it late at night on Saturday, Aug. 4. The Times account omits that the bill does not just allow surveillance of communications relating to terrorism. As long as one person on the call is believed to be overseas, no connection to terrorism is required -- only that "a significant purpose of the acquisition is to obtain foreign intelligence information.'' That is regarded by qualified observers as a virtual blank check, opening the doors for surveillance of any American who is in communication with someone in another country.