"He knows when you're awake..."

I know, Christmas is over. But the fact is: it's not only Santa who's running surveillance. No, no, the present U.S. Administration is helping Santa out with wiretaps of apparently any overseas phone calls (without court orders), video surveillance, undercover (or plain-clothes) infiltration into the by-all-accounts harmless activities of various groups (including the Catholic Worker, a "faith-based" group by any stretch of the imagination)...the list goes on.

And did we receive a sheepish apology from Administration officials? A reasonable explanation of what had been occurring and why? Not hardly. In a now-familiar strategy, Bush, when caught doing something wrong (and by wrong I mean dishonest, illegal, mistaken, and/or immoral), charges ahead more brazenly than ever! The headlines at Yahoo News a couple weeks ago, soon after a piece of the scandal broke, read, "Bush Vows More Eavesdropping." He was angry, yes...at the person(s) who had the gall to leak his quite-possibly-criminal-deeds to the press. One would think his supply of brazenness has gotta be running low.

Thankfully, "Brazen Bush" doesn't appear to be an effective strategy with the public or a portion of the media anymore. As unlikely a source as the editors of Barrons magazine, as reported on Democracy Now, have dared to mention the "I" word. (And I don't mean "intelligence." We gave up on that a while back...)

Here's a portion of what was published in Barrons:

Putting the president above the Congress is an invitation to tyranny. The president has no powers except those specified in the Constitution and those enacted by law. ... Willful disregard of a law is potentially an impeachable offense. It is at least as impeachable as having a sexual escapade under the Oval Office desk and lying about it later.

So you go right ahead, Mr. President. You do what you think needs to be done. But guess what? Turns out you're being watched, too.