The Bush Game: Spin... Lie... Backpeddle... Deny... Spin Again..

Gonzales Denies More Extensive Domestic Spying

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales told a key House Democrat yesterday that the administration is not conducting any warrantless domestic surveillance programs beyond the one that President Bush has acknowledged, the Democrat said in an interview.

Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) said Gonzales was responding to a fax she sent him Wednesday after she read a news account of his Feb. 28 letter to two senators. In the letter, Gonzales appeared to suggest there might be domestic wiretap operations that extend beyond the outlines Bush acknowledged in December. Gonzales asked to clarify his Feb. 6 testimony that the president's acknowledged use of the National Security Agency for domestic surveillance "is all that he has authorized." "I did not and could not address . . . any other classified intelligence activities," Gonzales wrote to the senators.

Harman, the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee, said she sent Gonzales a fax "seeking clarification about his written testimony, which has left room for the possibility of an additional program or a broader program" of surveillance without court approval.

White House counsel Harriet Miers called Harman on Wednesday, and Gonzales phoned yesterday, Harman said. She said both of them "assured me that there is not a broader program or an additional program out there involving surveillance of U.S. persons."

"It is inappropriate to discuss the private conversations between the attorney general and members of Congress, especially on matters of classified intelligence programs," Justice spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said in a statement.

Not to be a killjoy or too much of a conspiracy theorist, but the statements by Gonzalez and Miers don't wash with reports and leaks from elsewhere, not to mention that neither of them have genuine credibility after appearing before congress and making statements like "I cannot comment on the constitutionality of a law" (Gonzalez) and "George Bush is one of the most intelligent men I have ever known" (Miers).