Daschle stands up, four years too late

Former Senate majority/minority leader Tom Daschle (his dynamic leadership as majority leader played a major role in his becoming minority leader) writes in a WaPo op-ed today that the Senate never intended to give aWol the dictatorial powers (domestic warrantless wiretaps in particular) he now claims, nor would they have if they had known he would use the "use of force" resolution to make that power grab. He also notes that the Bushies tried to include the words "in the United States and" in the key sentence of the bill, as follows:

[Congress authorizes] "all necessary and appropriate force in the United States and against those nations, organizations or persons [the president] determines planned, authorized, committed or aided" [the attacks of Sept. 11].

Daschle refused to add the wording to the bill. In his op-ed today, he points out that if the Bushies really believed that the power they now claim were included in the wording of the bill, they would never have attempted to add the "in the United States" clause at all.