Laughing All The Way To Fascist Dicatorship

El Busho Loco deflected questions on his illegal wire-tapping today with alleged "humour". I though this was the funniest bit:

I am upholding my duty and at the same time doing so under the law and with the Constitution behind me. The FISA law was written in 1978. We're having the discussion in 2006. It's a different world...

I said, 'Look, is it possible to conduct this program under the old law?' And people said it doesn't work in order to be able do the job we expect us to do.

"We" expect "us" to do? I think that says it all, really. Hilarious. In other words, this damn law is blocking "us" from doing what "we" want to do - so let's ignore it!

God, that law was so-o-o-o 1970's... And the world is so-o-o-o different now, right? When was that stupid Constitution written, anyway? A long time before the Geneva Convention, which has already been dispensed with! And let's all try to ignore the embarrassing fact that Bush's own Justice Department declared in 2002 that the FISA law was working just fine!!! Dammit, that's three whole years ago! The world is different today!

What's even funnier is that, after admitting he circumvented this antiquated law, Bush still claims his wire-tapping program is legal:

"There's no doubt in my mind it is legal."

Choose the answer that suits your own personal mind-warp.

Listen, America, and listen carefully: the joke is on you.

Meanwhile, back at the White House, Scott McClellan avoided a very serious question, then attacked his questioner and finally elicited a laugh from the press corpse:

Q. You mentioned General Hayden -- well, General Hayden made it clear that this kind of surveillance has been going on under his authority, because he had the authority to do that. The difference is that on the domestic side, whoever was on, say, that telephone call was identified as person one or person two, and the information about that individual domestically was never shared throughout the government. With the President's authorization after 9/11, that changed, and then you began more specifically monitoring people domestically who were in contact with somebody overseas. So how can you say that that's not domestic?

MR. McCLELLAN: It's an early warning system. It's not aimed at long-term monitoring, like the FISA court was set up to do for a different enemy in a different time period when we were in the Cold War, remember. This was set up as an early warning system to detect and prevent attacks. So you're talking about for a shorter period of time. Its one purpose is to detect and prevent attacks.

Q That's totally off point. You're challenging the notion of domestic spying, when the truth of the matter is that heretofore the person domestically that was being surveilled was never identified, was never tracked in any real fashion. That changed when the President --

MR. McCLELLAN: Let me ask you this. Is an international communication overseas by an al Qaeda member coming into the United States, that is monitored overseas, is that a domestic communication?

Q Well, first of all, I ask the questions, I don't answer them. Number two --

MR. McCLELLAN: I'm sure you don't want to answer that question.

Q No, because I'm not in the business of setting the rules on this.

MR. McCLELLAN: That's a very simple question. I can put it right back to you.

Q I'm a reporter, I'm not responsible for authorizing these things. You speak for the President --

MR. McCLELLAN: Okay, okay.

Q -- so that's why I ask the questions.

MR. McCLELLAN: Okay, you don't want to answer that question. Got it. (Laughter.)

Who are the idiots responsible for all this "(laughter)" that turns up in Bush Co. news reports? And is it really (funny-ha-ha laughter) or just (nervously-watching-the-USA-disintegrate laughter)?