Bush added: "Yesterday the existence of this secret program was revealed in media reports, after being improperly provided to news organizations. As a result, our enemies have learned information they should not have, and the unauthorized disclosure of this effort damages our national security and puts our citizens at risk."

A la Pentagon Papers, information has leaked that's having an effect on the citizenry's perceptions of government policy and actions. If the Bush Administration tries to actually press charges on the New York Times, they will get nowhere with it. That's the only reason they are not threatening to do so. This is simply a PR play, but one I feel will backfire.

I do not see any direct legitimate way this is putting citizens at risk. I am sure al-Qaeda assumes any communications inside the United States could be monitored. Rather, I see this as exposing an abuse of executive powers that are putting citizens civil liberties at risk. There is no system of accountability in place.

This is starting to look more serious than a blow job.

"He's trying to claim somehow that the authorization for the Afghanistan attack after 9/11 permitted this, and that's just absurd," Feingold said. "There's not a single senator or member of Congress who thought we were authorizing wiretaps."

He added that the law clearly lays out how to obtain permission for wiretaps.

"If he needs a wiretap, the authority is already there -- the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act," Feingold said. "They can ask for a warrant to do that, and even if there's an emergency situation, they can go for 72 hours as long as they give notice at the end of 72 hours."

According to Bush, he has reauthorized the NSA's domestic wiretap program over thirty times.

Bush says he signed NSA wiretap order