One of George W. Bush's selling points was the meant what he said and he said what he meant. His campaign handlers knew that George W. was a little bit dumb, but that they could sell him as a guy who spoke from the gut and didn't back down. When the New York Times reported in December 2005 that the Administration was wiretapping phone conversations without a court order or warrant, Bush defiantly forged ahead and told the legal community to shove it.

Last year, a Federal judge ruled that the wiretapping program was illegal because it violated the constitutional prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures without a warrant and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act provides for a secret court to issue national security warrants. Bush argued that anyone opposing warrantless surveillance was actually against monitoring terrorists. He said, on October 30, 2006, "In all these vital measures for fighting the war on terror, the Democrats just follow a simple philosophy: Just say no. When it comes to listening to the terrorists, what’s the Democrats’ answer? It’s, just say no." This was poppycock, of course. No one opposes any program that monitors terrorists. We do oppose end runs around the law and Constitution.

Yesterday, Senators tore the Attorney General a new one on this issue. Here's a transcript from ThinkProgress:

During today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) confronted Attorney General Gonzales with these accusations. Gonzales denied they referred to elected officials, but instead to unnamed “blogs today”:

FEINGOLD: Do you know of anyone in this country, Democrat or Republican, in government or on the outside, who has argued that the United States government should not wiretap suspected terrorists?

GONZALES: Sure. I mean, if you look on the blogs today, there are all kinds of people who have very strong views about the ability of the government to surveil anyone for any reason. And so…

FEINGOLD: Do you know of anybody in government that has said that?

GONZALES: No. But my remarks — that’s not what I said. […]

FEINGOLD: […] Mr. Attorney General, as I said when Director Mueller was here, to me these comments are blatantly false. I think they do a disservice to the office of the attorney general. Falsely accusing the majority of this committee of opposing the wiretapping of terrorists is not going to be helpful to you, to the Justice Department, to Congress or to the American people.

GONZALES: Senator, I didn’t have you or this committee in mind when I made those comments.

The Administration is now abandoning the warrantless wiretapping program and allowing judges to issue warrants. Maybe this the consequence of real opposition party controlling Congress. Another consequence is Congress actually taking its responsibilities seriously and grilling Administration officials about bad polices and arrogant decisionmaking.

This happened the other day when another U.S. Senator, Pat Leahy (D-VT) also tore Attorney General Gonzales a new one over U.S. sponsorship of torture. Click here to view the satisfying video. After six years of a Republican Congress doing absolutely nothing to advance to social good, it's good to see the opposition party hit the Administration, and hit it hard.