NSA RULING

"The standing rules that Judge Taylor shunned are there for a reason. It is not a legalism. It is not some abstruse jurisprudential technicality that you’d need an Ivy League law degree to decipher. It is about the right of the American people to govern themselves.

Courts are not there to tell us how to live and tell the other branches how to do their jobs. They are there to redress concrete injuries that directly and uniquely affect individuals. If there is a government policy — such as monitoring al Qaeda’s international communications — that affects all of us more or less the same way, that is not a legal problem. It is a political issue.

Political issues get resolved by political actors. Here, the Framers trusted Americans, not judges. If a president tilts too far in the direction of either civil liberties or national security, the Americans who are consequently imperiled or intimidated have the final check. They can vote him out of office. If the president really shreds the Constitution (as opposed to using his daunting Article II powers to quell enemies and save American lives), citizens can spur congress to impeach him." -- Andrew McCarthy