Npr Sources

John-Nicholas Furst Fact Summary: President Bush ordered some phones and emails of US citizens to be tapped after September 11th 2001.The public didn’t know about this until December 2005. The Bush administration tried to prove that this was legal because “the Constitution gives the president inherent powers to authorize warrantless wiretaps to protect national security”(npr.org), and “Congress gave the president that power when, three days after the Sept. 11 attacks, it authorized him to use "all necessary and appropriate military force"’(npr.org). Paraphrase: President Bush authorized the wiretaps on some domestic phone calls and e-mails shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. (npr.org). Quote: “…it authorized him to use ‘all necessary and appropriate military force’ against al Qaeda” (npr.org).

Opinion The NPR article compares how the Bush administration and the non-biased Congressional Research Service interpret various U.S. laws and regulations. In every case the Bush administration interpretation was that their actions of tapping U.S. citizens was justified according to the stated laws and regulations. The Congressional Research Service took the opposite view of the Bush administration in every case, and in their interpretation found the Bush administration acted outside of the laws and regulations. The message of the NPR article was that the Bush administration was trying to use the constitution, which was meant to protect people’s rights, in a way that actually impinged on people’s rights.

Godoy, Maria. NSA Wiretapping: The Legal Debate. National Public Radio. January 15, 2006. May 26, 2006 .