Then, See, the Bullet Turns This Way . . . .

Remember when I warned those like Jack Cafferty who expected Arlen Spector to defend the Constitution from Bush the Younger on the NSA intrusions into our lives?

In a just world, he would already be halfway through a prison sentence for obstruction of justice in the worst crime in American history. It's a sign of how far we've fallen that, not only is he a Senator, he's been there forever, and people with a straight face could expect him to come out on the right side of the American Legacy v. the new Union of American Republican Republics. Mark this down--before he's done, Bush will have everything he wants, and Spector will get away with eviscerating this country once again.

By now, you've probably heard how, yes, indeed, he's backed off even a weak-ass reform to set up a process in which, to get NSA fishing to court for review, the fish would have to demonstrate that they were targets, which they, by definition, are unlikely to know, using classified information that NSA won't let them have. It's as beautiful in its idiotic simplicity as loopty-loop bullets that shatter heavy bones without becoming deformed. Greenwald, as usual, nails it:

Could anything be more obvious at this point than the fact that the Bush administration deeply fears having the legality of its eavesdropping activities adjudicated by a federal court?

And who is once again aiding and abetting this undermining of the Constitution? Seriously, people, this man's record has been clear since he pulled the same cover-up of federal incompetence in the Warren Report. How have we gotten to a place where he still is allowed in public without all the derision normally saved for Al Gore?