[Peptobismol]

FISA has an exception for spying done pusuant to other statutes. Congress passed a use of force resolution against Al Queda, Courts have ruled that the Constitutional role of Commander and Chief carries inherent authority to spy in the application of the use of force. Ergo, current controlling authority is that the program is perfectly legal under FISA because it falls clearly under the exceptions written into FISA.

I suspect that if it were that clear, there wouldn't have been a hearing yesterday.

You've summed up one of the arguments the Administration is making in defending the domestic spy program ... that the AUMF acts as a statute that gives Bush the authority to circumvent FISA. Yet many in Congress - from both sides of the aisle - who voted for the AUMF have said that particular interpretation is wrong, and that if they had intended the President to conduct warrantless electronic surveillance on US persons, they would have said so explicitly in the AUMF.