MYTH: This is merely a “terrorist surveillance program.” REALITY: When there is evidence a person may be a terrorist, both the criminal code and intelligence laws already authorize eavesdropping. This illegal program, however, allows electronic monitoring without any showing to a court that the person being spied upon in this country is a suspected terrorist.

MYTH: The program is legal. REALITY: The program violates the Fourth Amendment and Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and will chill free speech.

Continued…

The Congress yielded to President George W. Bush on Saturday and approved legislation to temporarily expand the government’s power to conduct electronic surveillance without a court order in tracking foreign suspects.

“We think it is not the bill that ought to pass,” said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer. But Hoyer conceded he and fellow Democrats were unable to stop the measure after a showdown with the White House amid warnings of possible attacks on the United States.

President Bush authorized a “series of secret surveillance activities” by executive order after Sept. 11, 2001, according to a letter from Bush Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell to Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA).

The disclosure marks the first time “that the administration has publicly acknowledged that Bush’s order included undisclosed activities beyond the warrantless surveillance of e-mails and phone calls that Bush confirmed in December 2005,” according to the Washington Post.

By the end of this year, police officials say, more than 100 cameras will have begun monitoring cars moving through Lower Manhattan, the beginning phase of a London-style surveillance system that would be the first in the United States.

The Lower Manhattan Security Initiative, as the plan is called, will resemble London’s so-called Ring of Steel, an extensive web of cameras and roadblocks designed to detect, track and deter terrorists. British officials said images captured by the cameras helped track suspects following the London subway bombings in 2005 and after the car bomb plots last month.

The attempted terror attacks in Britain prove the U.S. needs its domestic spying program and more surveillance cameras in American cities, two powerful lawmakers said yesterday.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman called for an end to the “petty, partisan fighting” over the National Security Agency’s warrantless wiretapping and e-mail spying efforts.

“I hope this week, based on what happened in the United Kingdom, President Bush [and] the bipartisan leadership of Congress will sit down and say, ‘Hey, let’s cut out the nonsense,’” Lieberman (I-Conn.) said on ABC’s “This Week.”