No checks and balances for the unbalanced.

Outside of President Steely Eyed Rocket Man, there is probably only one other man in Washington who should never ever have his finger on the button, or even be given anything other than round-tip sissors for that matter, than Attorney General John Ashcroft. So nothing should be scarier than this:

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Justice Department and FBI have dramatically increased the use of two little-known powers that allow authorities to tap telephones, seize bank and telephone records and obtain other information in counterterrorism investigations with no immediate court oversight, according to officials and newly disclosed documents.

The FBI, for example, has issued scores of "national security letters" that require businesses to turn over electronic records about finances, telephone calls, e-mail and other personal information, according to the officials and documents. The letters, a type of administrative subpoena, may be issued independently by FBI field offices and are not subject to judicial review unless a case comes to court, officials said.

Attorney General John Ashcroft also personally signed more than 170 "emergency foreign intelligence warrants," three times the number authorized in the preceding 23 years, according to recent congressional testimony.

[snip]

According to documents given to EPIC and the American Civil Liberties Union as part of their lawsuit, the FBI has issued enough national security letters since October 2001 to fill more than five pages of logs. There's no way to determine exactly how many times the documents have been employed because the logs were almost entirely blacked out, according to a copy provided to the Washington Post by the ACLU.

The Justice Department and FBI refuse to provide summary data about how often the letters are used. Several lawmakers have proposed legislation that would require the department to provide that kind of data.

FBI spokesman John Iannarelli said: "it's safe to say that anybody who is going to conduct a terrorism investigation is probably going to use them at some point. . . . It's a way to expedite information, and there's nothing that needs expediting more than a terrorism investigation."

Beryl Howell, former general counsel to Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and a specialist in surveillance law, described national security letters as "an unchecked, secret power that makes it invisible to public scrutiny and difficult even for congressional oversight."

Imagine that? Handing over unchecked power to a man who couldn't even beat a dead man in an election in his own home state because he was so disliked. He's getting closer to God than he ever imagined possible...and with a lot less snake-handling

(Thanks Chris)