The Security 'Tradeoff': Is Mitchell Channeling Mehlman?

In the ongoing debate about Bush's warrantless wiretaps, can we please put to rest a GOP talking point that has sadly already entered the media mainstream? Its latest carrier was Andrea Mitchell on Hardball last night, in which she speculated over how people will "handle this tradeoff" between civil liberties and security:

"An historic tradeoff, which Evan [Thomas] beautifully encapsulizes in his cover story in Newsweek, the trade off between national security and personal privacy, as he traces back, this is going back to 1798 with John Adams."

That's exactly how the GOP would like to frame this, with the implication that what Bush did was necessary for national security. But it's not at all a "trade off." Everything Bush did, at least as he's described it -- listening in on phone calls "from Al Qaeda" -- could have been done through FISA, since it's doubtful that the 4 or 5 cases FISA turned down -- compared to the 18,761 it approved -- involved "phone calls from Al Qaeda."

There is no "trade off" issue here. There is no amount of security that would have been "traded off" had Bush followed the law. He would have gotten all the wiretaps we needed and we'd have gotten all the security that resulted from them.

So, please, Andrea. We know Ken Mehlman wants you to frame it as a "trade off," but that doesn't mean you have to.