The most consequential part of President Bush’s State of the Union address tonight, at least in the near-term, will be the section he devotes to the need to ensure that the Nation’s law enforcement and intelligence communities have the tools they need to protect us. In particular, he will make a strong case for the Patriot Act – one we can only hope the minority of Senators currently blocking its reenactment will heed.
Mr. Bush afforded a small group of us an insight into his thinking on this and related matters, and a sense of the urgency he will attach to the Patriot Act’s renewal, in a meeting last Thursday. Those present included eighteen preeminent national security, intelligence, legal and public policy practitioners – nearly all of whom had previously held senior U.S. government posts and signed a letter to Congress circulated last week by the Coalition for Security, Liberty and the Law.
In informal remarks and extended, candid give-and-take with the participants, the President communicated the gravity of the peril we face. As Osama bin Laden’s most recent audio tape reminds us, enemies of this country remain intent on hitting us again, and hope to do so with even more devastating effect than on 9/11.
Two of those present knew firsthand the costs of the last attack on our homeland: Former Solicitor General Theodore Olson, who lost his wife, Barbara, on American Airlines Flight 77 when it was hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon; and Debra Burlingame, the sister of Capt. Charles “Chic” Burlingame, that doomed aircraft’s pilot.
In the four-plus years since September 11, 2001, both have selflessly served their country. Mr. Olson was, until recently, the third-ranking official in the Department of Justice and a leader on its counterterrorism litigation and policy-making.
For her part, Ms. Burlingame has become one of the most visible, and formidable, of the 9/11 family members in championing counterterrorism legislation and policies needed to prevent future terrorist attacks in this country – and opposing initiatives that would undermine America’s ability to do so.
Such concerns prompted her to write a powerful op.ed. article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal about the need to renew the Patriot Act and to continue presidentially authorized, warrantless “hot pursuit” of enemy communications by the National Security Agency – even when one of the parties is inside the United States and may be an American citizen. Under the headline, “Our Right to Security,” she observes: